


Overwatch Kid Continuity Prompts

by NiteWrighter



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Kid Fic, Moira Clones Herself, Multi, Next Generation, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2019-07-13 04:57:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 49
Words: 96,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16010741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NiteWrighter/pseuds/NiteWrighter
Summary: Overwatch Next-Gen Prompts spanning from the kids' early childhoods to their teenage/young adult years. A continuation ofGency Pregnancy and Domesticity Promptsbut expanded to include other pairings and characters and their OC kids. Like my other Overwatch Prompts works, the individual ficlets themselves are not written chronologically, but rather on a prompt-by-prompt basis and then ordered chronologically here, so there will be time jumps.





	1. Player One and Player 2

“I swear you’re going to burn a hole in that thing,” said Pharah.

They were both in a hospital waiting room. Satya had insisted on an outside doctor, and Pharah had agreed, since it wouldn’t be fair to heap Ob-Gyn duties on Mercy when she already had the infirmary and Rei to worry about now. Satya’s brows were furrowed as her eyes flicked between the pregnancy book and their IVF pamphlet. Pharah’s words snapped Satya out of her intense reading for a few brief moments.

“What?” said Satya.

“The way you keep glaring at it,” said Pharah, smiling.

“Well I always thought you admired my preparedness,” said Satya a bit haughtily, turning back to her book, “We need to plan this better—I don’t want you giving birth in that cramped little Watchpoint infirmary.”

“I won’t be giving birth on the Watchpoint” said Pharah, kissing Satya on the temple, “Promise.”

“Well certainly not if I have any say in it,” said Satya, turning back to her book. She was no longer glaring at the book, but now looking at the book, then looking at Pharah’s stomach, then looking at the book again, then looking at the stomach again, then looking at—

“What is it now?” said Pharah, now snapping Satya out of the feedback loop between book and stomach.

“I’m just not sure if you’re—if it’s… supposed to be this  _big_  this early on…” muttered Satya, looking at the book again, “I don’t know if it’s your diet or–or it could be swelling–what if it’s ectopic?!”

“Please tell me you haven’t been reading those horror stories again,” said Pharah, “I feel fine. Don’t worry.”

Satya paused and then she sighed, “We’re already risking so much just  _doing_  this when Talon and Vishkar…” 

Pharah reached over and squeezed Satya’s hand. “You remember what you said to me when we decided we were going to do this?”

“‘I’m no longer letting Vishkar determine what I do with my life,’” said Satya, leaning back in her seat slightly.

“And we can handle anything this world throws at us,” said Pharah.

“Mrs and… Mrs Amari?” an attendant opened the door to the waiting room, “We’re all ready for you.”

Pharah gave Satya a thumbs up as Satya stood up and helped Pharah to her feet.

—

“Hi!” A perky omnic in scrubs was in the ultrasound room, “I’m Epi-01, and I’m going to be your ultrasound tech today!”

“Tech as in, technician, or tech as in… tech?” said Pharah as Satya helped her onto the imaging table and pulled up her shirt, exposing her stomach.

“Yes!” said Epi-01 as she extended a chord from her head and connected it to a screen next to the exam table.

Satya and Pharah exchanged glances.

The procedure was pretty efficient, as expected of an omnic. The most jarring thing about it was that as soon as the ultrasound gel was applied, Pharah expected Epi-01 to reach over and grab a sonographic wand but she… didn’t. She just kept her hands on Pharah’s stomach, then there was a slight hum, and the screen Epi-01 had plugged the chord from her head into lit up with a black and white image.

“Well everything seems to be proceeding smoothly,” said Epi-01, not even looking at the screen but the lights on her forehead glowing and fading in pattern with the hums of the ultrasound, “You can’t really distinguish the developing body parts this early on, but both embryos look perfectly healthy.”

“That’s good to he–Did you just say both?” said Pharah.

“B-both? As in… two?” said Satya.

“Yep! Both embryos! Twins are actually very common in IVF pregnancies–Here, I’ll show you!” The omnic shifted her hands over Pharah’s stomach slightly, revealing a grayish blob on the ultrasound, “There’s player one,” she shifted her hands upward, revealing another blob, “And there’s player two! One’s a little bigger than the other but that’s pretty normal–”

Satya dropped to the ground in a faint.

“Satya!” Pharah blurted out.

—

“…That was embarrassing,” Satya was slumped back in the passenger seat of the car as they drove back to the Watchpoint.

“At least it was only for like… three minutes,” said Pharah with a shrug.

“Twins,” Satya said the word to herself and then gestured at Pharah’s stomach, “ _Twins!_ I can’t believe I didn’t realize it sooner—So many variables now…”

“…does this mean you’re going to get 47 more books?” said Pharah.

“Do you think that will be enough?” said Satya, running a hand through her hair.

 Pharah just snorted. “I love you, Satya,” said Pharah, as they pulled up to the Watchpoint gate and were halted, and then welcomed in by a waving Orisa.

They parked the car near the Watchpoint residences and Pharah found herself in a tight embrace from Ana no more than ten seconds after shutting the door behind her.

“Habībti—!” Ana cupped her hands to Pharah’s face, “Is it true?”

Pharah held up two fingers and suddenly found her face covered in pecking kisses from her mother.

“Mum–Mum, come on!” said Pharah, laughing under the barrage of kisses.

“You told her already?” said Satya.

“Well I told her to get the couch ready at home since you fainted, and then I had to say  _why_  you fainted so…” Pharah shrugged.

“Oh dear are you feeling all right?” asked Ana, quickly turning to Satya.

“I’m fine, just… caught a bit off-guard is all,” said Satya, tucking her hair back.

“Well both of you come in, quickly! You’ll have to tell me all about it!” said Ana, hurrying up the stairs to the apartment. Pharah, naturally, was a bit slower than normal.

“Good to know we’ve got an eager future grandma,” said Pharah, putting her hand over her stomach as she hefted herself up the stairs.

“Here—” Satya took her arm and helped her up.

“Satya–I’m fine. You’re the one who fainted,” said Pharah as Satya ascended the stairs with her.

“And you’re the one with twins,” returned Satya with that smug little smile of hers.

“How are you feeling about that?” said Pharah as they reached the top of the stairs.

“It’s as you said, isn’t it?” said Satya, “Anything this world can throw at us.”

Pharah smiled as Satya hooked her arm in hers and leaned her head on her shoulder as they walked into the apartment. 


	2. Name Game

“What makes you so sure they’re boys?” Satya was trailing her fingers over Pharah’s stomach as they lay on the couch together.

“I don’t know,” Pharah’s hand was guiding Satya’s hand around her stomach, trying to find the point where one of the twins was brushing up against her, “It’s just like… this strong feeling. I just started calling my dad twice as often as I usually do… like I feel like he’s closer even though he’s all the way over in Vancouver. Maybe it’s these guys.”

“Maybe it’s  _one_  of them,” said Satya, “Or maybe they’re both girls.”

“You want girls?” Pharah smiled.

“I’ll be happy with whatever we get but…” Satya trailed off, “My parents sent me off to one of Vishkar’s boarding schools as soon as it was available… they knew it would give me what I need, but… one of my most vivid memories of my mother is her brushing my hair before bed. She did it every night. I never really thought of children of my own until I met you, but during the fertility clinic visits well… that was my image in my head. Me, combing the hair of a little girl as beautiful as you.” 

Pharah smiled and kissed Satya on the temple.

“So what did you talk to your dad about today?” said Satya, snuggling up a little closer under Pharah’s arm.

“Just the ‘boy’ feelings, mostly,” said Pharah, “He says if one of them’s a boy, I have to name him after him.”

“ _Sam?_ ” Satya repeated the name with disgust in her voice.

“He was joking but–Hey! What’s wrong with ‘Sam?’” said Pharah, “I like ‘Sam’…”

“It’s as if a hard, flat,  _rock_  was a name,” said Satya a bit haughtily. She leaned down and whispered to Pharah’s stomach, “This is why you need to be girls. We cannot let the fate of a name like ‘Sam’ befall either of you.”

“Samantha,” said Pharah.

“ _Ugh,_ ” Satya bunched her shoulders up with revulsion and Pharah burst out laughing.

“Well what names do  _you_  want?” said Pharah.

“Something  _regal,”_  said Satya, taking one of Pharah’s hair beads between her fingers and watching it glint in the light of the afternoon, “Balamani or Deepika…”

“Okay, what about boy names?” said Pharah.

“Oh that’s easy. Vivaan and Vihaan,” said Satya.

“One letter off? That’s going to drive them crazy,” said Pharah, grinning.

“But they  _match,_ ” insisted Satya, “They are going to be identical, after all.”

“You and your symmetry…” Pharah mumbled with an eye roll as she readjusted herself on the couch slightly. They stayed there for a few minutes, Satya shifting her hand over Pharah’s stomach, trying to feel for them, when Pharah suddenly said, “Oh. Samira.”

“I rather like ‘Samira’…” said Satya, thoughtfully.

“Good, because–woah–” she cut herself off at a hard kick.

Satya suddenly perked up. “I felt that!!” she said, grinning widely, “That was both of them!”

“Yep,” said Pharah with a breathless chuckle, “Guess they like ‘Samira’ too.”

“I knew it,” said Satya, readjusting herself on the couch and bending and kissing Pharah’s stomach, “I knew you were on my side,” she whispered, “Team Girl.”

“Well, ‘Samir’ is the boy version of ‘Samira’ so…”

“ _Team Girl,_ ” Satya whispered to Pharah’s stomach again.


	3. "Gross"

Pharah glanced up from her tablet to see a familiar flame-like sprig of black hair and a pair of deadly serious dark gray eyes. Pharah adjusted herself from where she was propped up on the couch. Rei was staring, those Shimada brows furrowed at Pharah’s stomach.

“You seem very… focused,” said Pharah.

“Does it hurt?” asked Rei. Rei was only just barely understandable at this point, her language still caught between trying to fit as many syllables into a sentence as possible from her father’s side, and the harsh consonant sounds of her mother’s side.

Pharah chuckled a little, “No it doesn’t hurt. I mean… sometimes there’s little hurts and I get sore in spots and tired easy, and I miss flying… _god,_  I miss flying —but it doesn’t really hurt.”

“There’s two?” said Rei.

“Yep. Two,” said Pharah.

“Why’d you get two?” asked Rei.

“That’s just how it turned out, I guess,” said Pharah.

“How do they  _fit?_ ” said Rei, stepping around the corner of the couch and pulling herself up so she was hanging off the opposite armrest.

“I ask myself that every time I look down,” said Pharah with a slight smile.

“How’d they get in there?” said Rei.

“Satya and I decided we loved each other very much and wanted children, so we went to a doctor and she put them in there,” said Pharah, giving the answer she had rehearsed with herself specifically for this moment.

“Both of them?” said Rei.

“Well… the doctor said they’re identical, so it’s more like they started out as one, and then split into two,” said Pharah.

“Gross!” said Rei.

“Oh very gross,” Pharah agreed, “It’s the best.”


	4. Baby Shower Shopping

Mercy loved the way Rei walked. There was the signature 17-month-old wobbling unsureness of how much weight to put on each foot and where, but she moved with a clear toddling determination that was unmistakeably reminiscent of Genji. Mercy leaned her weight on Rei’s stroller slightly, watching as Rei puttered across the tiles of the store, her little black tuft of a ponytail bobbing. 

“Twins,” there was a puzzling mutter in Genji’s voice as he looked over the baby shower registry on Mercy’s tablet, “Of course it’s twins.”

“Twins mean two!” Rei called, just in case either of them forgot that.

“Yes it does, Sunneschii,” said Mercy.

“They split into two, and that’s gross but I can’t say it’s gross,” said Rei.

Mercy snickered, “Yes, that would be rude.”

 “Hm,” the light of Genji’s visor flared with focus at the tablet he was holding, “Do we get two of whatever we get them? Just one? Should there be two check boxes next to everything on the registry?”

Mercy just snickered, “I’m sure we can figure something out,” she said, watching Rei slow her determined pace and stare at a display of nightlights.

“And how much do we actually need to get them if Satya can just… spin cribs and carriers out of thin air with hard-light?” said Genji.

“You’re overthinking this,” said Mercy.

“O-ver-think-ing this,” Rei parroted, timing her steps to the syllables. Mercy made a ‘See?’ gesture at Rei and Genji just chuckled.

“Well you know Satya. She has… standards,” said Genji, “She and Pharah always helped us out so much, I don’t want to disappoint her.”

“Well, most everyone in the old Overwatch knew Pharah when she was small,” said Mercy with a shrug, “God knows the whole watchpoint is going to be pouring their hearts out for her. She made the old Overwatch feel even more like a family. Of course they’d return the favor.”

“I missed a lot in those days, didn’t I?” Genji said a bit thoughtlessly.

Mercy pushed Rei’s empty stroller up next to him and put a hand on his shoulder, “You’re here now,” she said with a smile.

Genji gave a glance over to Rei shoving herself into a clothing rack, so that the only parts visible of her behind the curtain of maternity shirts were her little light-up sneakers. “Yes,” he said quietly, “It’s a good place to be.”

Genji had paused next to the crib displays in the store and gave one of the crib mobiles a tentative spin.

“…mobiles are probably redundant with Hard-light,” he murmured.

“Mobiles are definitely redundant with hard-light,” said Mercy.

“It seemed like we had a never-ending list of things we needed when  _she_  was on the way,” said Genji, gesturing over at Rei pushing out from the clothing rack before looking back down at the tablet, “Why is getting this stuff for someone else so hard?”

“I don’t think it has to be  _that_  hard,” said Mercy, trailing her fingers underneath his jaw plate and prompting him to look up and over at another display of strollers, with one particularly athletic-looking dark blue stroller with two seats displayed prominently on a platform.

“…That works,” said Genji.

—-

Rei was sitting in her stroller and kicking her feet back and forth singing nonsensically to herself as they pushed the large box of the stroller through the checkout. 

“Siblings on the way?” the cashier asked casually as they made the purchase. Both Mercy and Genji burst out laughing.

“No–No, it’s for a friend,” said Mercy, looking down at Rei, “Sunneschii’s more than enough for now.”

“Ahhh yeah I get that, I should have figured as such with the omnic au pair,” said the cashier.

Mercy paused mid-putting her wallet back in her purse, “Beg pardon?” she looked up.

“Oh–sorry! I didn’t mean to assume–Just, y’know, everyone needs help, takes a village and you can’t go wrong with an omnic and all that,” the cashier nodded towards Genji.

“I’m the father,” the words fell out of Genji with a hardness and flatness even he didn’t really expect from himself.

The cashier’s face dropped.  _“Oh,”_  she managed, and then cleared her throat, “Well that’s–She’s a beautiful girl. Congratulations, both of you. Thanks for shopping at Cowan’s.”

—

Genji carried the box out of the store as Mercy pushed Rei’s stroller towards the hover-van. They loaded it up silently and Rei dozed off in her carseat on the ride home. Mercy gave a glance to Rei sleeping in the rearview mirror as Genji drove before she fidgeted with her hands in her lap a bit.

“I am so sorry about that—” Mercy started.

“That had nothing to do with you,” said Genji, “She didn’t know–Anyone could have…” he trailed off and huffed, “I mean I know it was bound to happen sooner or later…” he felt at his faceplate, “Maybe I shouldn’t…”

“Genji, you should wear whatever makes you feel most comfortable,” said Mercy.

“I know but…” Genji sighed and gave a glance to Rei in the rearview mirror as well before looking back at the road, “Ever since she came into our lives, it’s been so exciting being someone… new. Being her father. Not having to think of myself as this bridge between man and machine like Zenyatta always saw me as, that, granted, I made peace with myself as… but… Genji Shimada could just be a father. And that meant the world to me… but I suppose it was so easy to get caught up in that that I could forget…everything else about myself. I learned a long time ago to not mind the assumptions people make about my appearance, but when someone assumes I’m not my daughter’s father it’s… it’s like…”

“How dare they?” Mercy suggested.

_“How dare they,”_  Genji repeated the words with a certain satisfaction.

Mercy chuckled. “For what it’s worth… I think the people who count the most know you’re her father,” she reached over and gave Genji’s shoulder a slight squeeze before looking back at Rei in her carseat, her cheek smushed against her seat’s padding. “She always knows it’s you. Whether the mask is on or not.”

“She does, doesn’t she?” Genji said quietly. Mercy could hear the smile in his voice.

Mercy settled into her seat slightly, smiling as they drove home.


	5. Gency Fluff Ft. Rei

“Angela,” a soft voice near her ear and a light touch on her shoulder drew her back from sleep.

“Mm?” her eyes opened blearily and she found herself on the couch of their apartment, looking at Genji’s scarred, smiling face. “How did…?” she glanced over his shoulder to their television to see credits rolling and sighed. “How far did I make it?”

“Two-thirds,” said Genji, he pointed down, “She made it a bit further.”

Mercy glanced down. Rei was in her pachimari-printed pajamas and curled up against Mercy, sleeping with her head in Mercy’s lap. “..Oh,” said Mercy softly. She brushed some of Rei’s hair out of her face and Rei grunted and stirred, curling up tighter. Mercy smiled a little.

“She’s beautiful,” Mercy said, stroking Rei’s hair.

“As beautiful as her mother,” said Genji.

Mercy broke her eyes way from Rei only briefly to look at Genji and smiled before glancing down back to her daughter, “She moves around so much when she’s awake, I hardly ever get to just… look at her like this,” said Mercy, softly. 

“For the record she gets that from you just as much as me,” said Genji.

Mercy huffed. “She definitely got this from me too,” she said as Rei snored softly and tightened her grip on her Midori Rider action figure. They stared at Rei a while longer. “…We probably should get her to bed,” said Mercy, after a long while.

Genji nodded and gently took Rei up in his arms. “Come on,” he said, standing up. The Midori Rider slipped from Rei’s grip as Genji picked her up and Mercy stooped to pick it up as Genji walked down the hall to Rei’s room. Mercy caught up with Genji just as he was tucking Rei into bed. She knelt next to Rei’s bed and kissed her forehead, then readjusted the sheets and comforter around Rei.

“We really should get her a plush,” murmured Genji as Mercy tucked in Rei’s Midori Rider action figure in next to her, “Something cuddly…”

“I like the Sentai figure,” said Mercy, brushing a bit more of Rei’s hair out of her face, “I like to think it keeps her safe.” 

Genji chuckled. “Sounds like you could use a bit more sleep yourself,” he said.

Mercy smiled as they walked out of Rei’s room. “Only if you come with me,” she said, hooking her arm in his as they headed down the hall to their room.

“Well if you _insist_ ,” said Genji, the smile still in his voice as they headed to bed.


	6. Mistletoe

“There’s no chimney,” said Rei, wrestling with a string of tinsel as her parents hung decorations up around the Watchpoint rec room. Mercy glanced down at Rei from her stepladder,

“There’s what?” said Mercy, looking away from the garland of pine and poinsettias she was putting up.

“There’s no chimney,” Rei said again, “How’s Santa going to get in?” 

“Uh…”

“Magic,” said Genji, calling over from the table where he was skillfully slicing up dozens of paper snowflakes.

“Yes, Magic,” said Mercy, “Lots of houses don’t have chimneys, so Santa gets in through magic.”

Rei’s brow furrowed at this and she seemed almost satisfied by this answer, but then perked up, “What about the turrets?”

“What about them?” said Mercy, pinning up the garland.

“What if they fire on him?” said Rei. She suddenly seemed even more alarmed. “What about Mr. Lindholme’s anti-aircraft guns? What if we kill Santa?!” 

“Santa… is… a registered friendly with the Watchpoint security system,” said Mercy.

“Noncombatant friendly,” Genji added, “He’ll be fine.”

Rei gave a very serious “Hm,” (she had gotten into the habit of trying to imitate Hanzo) and then resumed digging through the box of decorations while half-tied up in tinsel. Mercy stepped down from the ladder and took a few steps back to make sure the garland looked even. She glanced over her shoulder to see Rei’s green-legging clad legs kicking out over the side of the box.

“Sunneschii–” Mercy hurried over and fished Rei out of the box to find her clutching a spherical bunch of silk mistletoe.

“Oh–that’s where that was,” she said, looking at the mistletoe.

Rei interpreted her mother’s interest in the ball of fake leaves as an apparent mark of value for the object and held it close. “What is it?” asked Rei, turning it over in her hands. 

“It’s for kissing,” said Mercy, with a smirk.

“Blech!” Rei pushed the mistletoe into Mercy’s hands, “Why?”

“Because this time of year people like to focus on love, and peace, and joy, and sometimes that involves kissing,” said Mercy, rising to her full height and walking over and pinning the mistletoe up so it hung over the rec room doorway, “It’s not always kissing, of course. Some older stories said that no swords could cross in its presence.”

“What if I  _want_  swords?” said Rei.

“We’ve been over this. You’re too young for swords,” said Genji, unfolding an intricately cut paper snowflake.

“Santa’s going to bring me a sword,” said Rei, folding her arms confidently.

“Santa’s going to bring you a shinai, if you’re good and promise to be responsible with it,” said Genji, setting to work on the next snowflake.

“Although Mrs. Claus will continue to voice her concerns about giving a child a weapon,” said Mercy, putting her hands on her hips and making eye contact with Genji, “Even if it’s bamboo.”

“And Santa will continue to reassure her that it’s no more a weapon than a baseball bat,” said Genji, getting up from the table and walking over, “And plenty of kids get those for Christmas.”

“You guys must talk to Santa a lot,” said Rei, hauling a tangled string of lights out of the box.

“Oh yes, very much,” said Genji, leaning against the doorway, “You know, non-combatant friendly and so on.” Mercy still had a skeptical look on her face but Genji gave her a small smile. His eyes flicked up to the mistletoe over the doorway and his smile stretched into a grin, tugging his scars with it as he put a hand at Mercy’s waist. Mercy snorted and rolled her eyes a little as he pulled her in to a kiss. 

“But what if Overwatch is on the naughty list because—BLEECHHH!!!” Rei looked up from her tangled mass of lights over at her parents who were only just breaking apart from the kiss.

“I  _did_  say it was for kissing,” said Mercy.


	7. Rei Shimada: Ghost Hunter

At four years old, Rei has a decent understanding of the concept of ghosts, and while Winston continually asserts that ghosts are not thermodynamically possible, little Rei is 90% sure the Watchpoint is haunted. She knows the adults don’t like  _talking_  about the ghost when she’s around, because they always stop talking when they catch her listening in, and this only confirms her suspicions more. She knows the ghost is not a friendly ghost, otherwise her parents wouldn’t sound so worried when they talk about him. The grownups are clearly too afraid to do anything about him, so she must take matters into her own hands. 

She makes a point to look for the ghost in her wanderings around the Watchpoint, though she is not sure what she will do when she finds it. She arms herself with a broom and a flashlight, tells the twins to stay behind where it’s safe (at two, they are both obviously far too young for ghost-hunting, as opposed to her much-more-experienced four years), and goes out to solve the mystery. She searches the most likely spots for the ghost: The spooky basement, the boiler room which makes scary noises, Torbjörn’s workshop that also makes scary noises, and the training bot repair bay, but no luck. She manages to wander back to Winston’s lab and Athena’s main monitor, where Jack is sitting semi-hunched over the desk, eyes closed and his chin resting in his hand. She sees the image of the ghost on Athena’s screen. Much of the writing is too tiny for her to read. There is a dark hood and a terrifying animal-skull-like face. No wonder no one tells her about the ghost. The largest text, she sees, is the name of the ghost.

“Gabrill Rees,” she reads with the utmost solemnity. Now she knows the Ghost’s name, and she knows what she must do. There’s only one way to summon a ghost. She goes to the watchpoint public restroom and scrambles up onto the counter on her knees, still holding her broom and flashlight. She maneuvers the broom slightly so that it’s touched against the light switch of the bathroom. Staring at her own reflection in the mirror, she says the ghost’s name slowly.

“Gabrill Rees,” she says the name, “Gabrill Rees, Gabrill Rees.”

She flicks the bathroom light off with the broom bristles and waits. Nothing. She frowns and flicks the light back on.

“Gabrill Rees. Gabrill Rees. Gabrill Rees,” she says again, a little annoyed, and flicks the light off. Again, nothing. This ghost doesn’t seem to understand the rules at all. She flicks the light back on again. Maybe the ghost just can’t hear her.

“GABRILL REES! GABRILL REES! GABRILL REES!” She hollers in the mirror before flicking the light off. The door to the bathroom suddenly opens and Rei sees a dark shape blocking out the light from the hall in the mirror.

“ _There_  you are, Sunshine, I thought I heard you. Your Ma’s been worried si–”

Rei shrieks at the top of her lungs and smacks the figure with broom and jumps down from the counter, giving the figure another smack with the broom for good measure.

McCree was not expecting to be assaulted with cleaning supplies upon finding his niece and manages to grab hold of the bristles on the second strike before flicking the bathroom light on. “Kid–Kid, quit it! It’s  _me!_ ” 

Rei is grabbing at the broom handle, trying to wrench it from his grip before she sees his face. 

“Don’t scare me!” She scolds him, “There’s a ghost! It’s dangerous!”

“Kiddo, you can play all the pretend games you want, but can you  _please_  do them without wandering off where your mom and dad can’t find you and without attacking me with a broom?” 

“I’m not pretending! I saw him on the computer!” snaps Rei. 

“On the computer…?” McCree starts a bit confusedly, then squats down to her level, “Look, not everything you see on TV or on the computer is real—”

“His names Gabrill Rees and he’s all in black with a skull face and everyone’s scared of him!” says Rei.

“Gabri—” McCree starts and then his eyes widen. “Gabe….” McCree says with a sigh, “ _Gabriel Reyes,_  not Gabrill Rees.”

“So he’s real?” Rei grips her broom a bit tighter.

“A lot more real than we’d like,” says McCree, “But he’s not a ghost, kiddo.”

“But he’s bad?” Rei’s eyebrows crinkle a little. 

“Well… he didn’t… used to be bad,” McCree rubs the back of his neck, “It’s a long story, and it’s one you’re a little young for.” 

“Why are all the important stories the ones I’m too young for?” Rei furrows those bushy Shimada brows poutingly.

McCree just huffs as he pulls himself back up to his full height and ruffles her hair a little, “That’s the way it shakes out, Sunshine. But I promise we’ll tell you everything one day, good and bad. And I promise you, long as I’m breathin’, he’s not going to get you, okay? You don’t have to chase after him. It ain’t your fight.”

“But I won’t let him get you either!” says Rei.

“Well judging by the way you can handle a broom, I feel safer already,” says McCree, “Come on, let’s get you back to your folks.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't usually write in present tense, but since Rei's so young here, it sort of felt appropriate for her to experience things as present tense. Also I love the weird limited logic young children operate by and how they try to understand their world.


	8. Anahardt Babysitting

The Watchpoint tarmac was a mess of chalk. Rei had declared herself leader as the oldest and had valiantly done her best to play with the twins, but, as a five-year-old playing with two three-year-olds, the results were a bit mixed. They had a ball at one point, and attempted to play a three-person version of four-square, with Rei drawing out a wobbly chalk circle divided into crooked thirds, but then Rei had ended up bouncing the ball a little too hard, hitting Samir in the face, and they decided maybe the ball time was over. So now the three of them were feverishly drawing in chalk all over the tarmac. 

“I need the blue,” said Rei.

“No,” said Samir, apparently busying himself with a light blue oval.

“I need it for the dragons,” said Rei.

“You said you needed green for the dragon,” said Samir.

“I made the green dragon, I need blue for the  _other_  dragons,” said Rei.

“I’m making a teleporter,” said Samir.

“Dragons are bigger,” said Rei.

“I’ve got yellow!” said Rajeev.

“Can I have it?” said Rei.

“No,” said Rajeev.

Rei plopped down, arms folded, pouting.

“You’re supposed to share!” Ana called out to the three of them. All three of them looked up from the chalk to her. “And say please and thank you!” Ana added. Reinhardt stepped alongside her, handed her a mug of tea, and sat down next to her.

“So… this is the sibling experience,” said Ana, watching as Rajeev and Samir’s drawings got closer and closer until they were both elbowing each other hard, both trying to lay claim to the blacktop before they broke out into bickering and Rei attempted to break them up but having little luck. Ana chuckled a little.

“Messier than you expected?” said Reinhardt.

“Children usually are,” said Ana with a shrug, “Still… I always wondered…” she trailed off. She sipped her tea. “Sam and I,” she said, “We talked about giving Fareeha a little brother or sister. With all the traveling we did, it would be nice for her to have someone close to her own age to grow up with,” she swirled her tea in her mug.

“Then came the Crisis,” said Reinhardt. He picked up the ball that was sitting next to him and tossed it out onto the tarmac, breaking Rajeev’s focus away from the chalk and stopping the bickering as Rajeev ran after the ball.

“Then came the Crisis,” said Ana with a weary smile, “It changed things. When the dust finally settled, Sam went back to Canada and me… Well… You know the story there,” she sipped her tea, “It wasn’t fair to Fareeha,” she added, “She grows up and Overwatch–we’re all she has—of course she wants to be like us… And of course I don’t want that for her. But if this is all she knows…” Ana sighed, “Sometimes I think if she had just had someone other than me–someone other than Overwatch, maybe things would have gone better between us.”

“For what it’s worth,” said Reinhardt, “I grew up in a big family–loud, boisterous.”

“Why am I not suprised?” said Ana, glancing over at Rei who, no longer having as much competition for the chalk was feverishly drawing. Rei brushed her hair out of her face, leaving a streak of yellow chalk across her forehead.

 “All those siblings, all those cousins… You need to think of some way to stand out. What better way than being a crusader? Than being a hero? There’s different ways to reach the same choices,” he shrugged, “You know… I always thought you were a good mother, even with everything thrown at you.”

“…except for the ‘letting everyone believe i was dead’ part,” said Ana.

“Well that goes without saying,” said Reinhardt, “Still…” he said slowly, “Watching you with Fareeha.. way back in those days…” he chuckled a little.

“What?” said Ana.

“Ah–Angela always chided me about settling down, setting the armor aside–I could never do that,” said Reinhardt, “‘Fight to my dying breath’ and all that, but whenever I saw you…whenever I’d see the way Fareeha hugged you, the smile on your face–I’d think… ‘if there was anyone I’d settle down for…’” He looked over to Ana. He smiled. Ana blinked a few times.

“You’re making me blush, you old fool,” she said, elbowing him and snickering before she looked at the twins, Rajeev leaning over his brother’s shoulder with a ball under his arm as Samir still scribbled away with his chalk. “Children change you,” Ana said quietly, “You don’t just change yourself you— you want the world to change. You don’t want them to go through what you’ve gone through.” she smiled, as the twins chatted, Rajeev pointing and commenting on Samir’s drawing’s and Samir apparently correcting them as Rajeev spoke, with Rei working silently, those Shimada brows of hers furrowed. “I think you always end up thinking your child deserved better. I don’t know if it can be helped. And yet… Fareeha ended up with twice the challenge, and she’s doing twice as well as I did,” Ana said with a smile.

“So you did something right,” said Reinhardt.

Ana looked over at him, then put a hand on his shoulder, pulled herself up to his level, and kissed him on the cheek, then glanced away from him to see Rei. Her forearms were rainbows of chalk dust, and patches of multicolored dust were all down the front of her green jumper, as well as patches of yellow and green on her cheek and forehead from where she would brush her hair out of her face. “I drew a thing,” said Rei.

“Did you, now?” said Reinhardt, getting to his feet.

Rei nodded and then grabbed his hand and then started pulling. Ana couldn’t help but snicker at how small Rei was in comparison to her namesake, yet that didn’t deter Rei, who grunted as she hauled at Reinhardt’s arm with all her might. Eventually Reinhardt humored her and got to his feet, and walked out over the tarmac with her. Ana smiled and followed after them.

“See?” Rei pointed down at a mass of chalk drawings, overlapping each other, barely recognizable. Reinhardt bent close to one. 

“That is a very good monster,  _Sunneschii!_ ” said Reinhardt, “Truly terrifying!”

“…that’s you,” said Rei, “…you’re in armor.”

“Oh–uh–Ah! I mean yes! Very good! Very handsome!” said Reinhardt.

“I drew you, Grandma,” said Samir, pointing to an amorphous blue blob with a streak of white that was next to Rei’s Reinhardt drawing, “And Mom,” he pointed to another blue blob, though this one looked like it had white cat ears.

“I drew mom, too!” said Rajeev, pointing to another blue figure with crude wings surrounded by bright yellow explosions, “And I drew Canada Grandpa!” He pointed to a figure in red. ‘Canada Grandpa’ had come to be Sam’s official title in the family.

“Ah I see!” Reinhardt said, scanning across the drawings. He pointed to an orange and white figure with crooked yellow wings and looked at Rei, “Your mother?” Rei nodded.

 “And dad,” she pointed to a white figure with what looked like a cat head with a green ‘V’ on its face and a long green stick, “And my uncles.” She pointed to a red blob with a large hat, and a blue figure with a yellow ribbon trailing off of it. Reinhardt glanced and realized Rei had put almost all of her artistic energy towards green and blue… snakes? No, dragons. 

“You drew all this?” said Reinhardt.

“I like drawing,” said Rei.

“It’s very good,” said Reinhardt. He heard the click of a camera and looked over at Ana. She had taken the camera out and was taking pictures of all the chalk drawings. He smiled a bit to himself.

If there was anyone he’d settle down for…


	9. Spiderbyte Fam Christmas

“Araña,” Sombra’s voice was hushed.

“Mm,” Widowmaker said nothing but squeezed a bit tighter around Sombra’s waist.

“Everything’s all set up, right?” said Sombra, “We didn’t forget anything?”

“If we did, it can wait until morning,  _Mon coeur,_ ” mumbled Widowmaker, her breath cool against Sombra’s spinal implants.

“We can’t mess this up,” said Sombra,

“We won’t mess it up,” said Widowmaker, leaning over and kissing Sombra’s ear, “So worried…” she kissed Sombra’s temple, “When you’ve been working so hard…” she kissed Sombra’s neck, “No one expects you to get it 100% right on your first try. You’re doing fine. Now please sleep.”

Sombra sighed. “I just… it’s her first Christmas here, and it’s been so long since I—”

She was cut off at the sudden sound of a door sliding open. Both she and Widowmaker sat up to see a small figure flinch back from the doorway, clearly not used to the sound.

“Martina—” Sombra got out of bed quickly and hurried over, “Is something wrong? Do you need water—how are you—?”

Marti suddenly clung against Sombra’s legs, saying nothing. Marti’s breath shuddered a little and Sombra dropped down to her level. “Hey–hey it’s okay.” Sombra kissed Marti’s forehead. “It’s okay. You’re okay.” She gave a glance over to Widowmaker. “Come on,” said Sombra, taking Marti’s hand and leading her over to the bed. Widowmaker scooted over as Marti clambered up. Sombra climbed up into bed after her.

“Can you show me it again?” said Marti.

“Of course,” said Sombra, bringing up a violet screen and playing a video.

 _“Heeeyyyy!”_ a woman in full Los Muertos makeup with scarves braided into her hair and a crown of silk flowers was throwing peace signs at the camera, with Sombra in the background. The dialogue was almost entirely in Spanish, with some Yucatec spliced in, but Widowmaker knew the conversation almost beat by beat at this point, Marti had asked to watch it so many times.

“Nice hair,” said Widowmaker, smirking at the pink mohawk, Marti herself was transfixed by the woman in the silk flowers.

 _“Sombra, come on, say hi,”_  said Soledad, glancing over her shoulder.

 _“You know I don’t like cameras,”_  said Sombra, folding her arms.

 _“You know, you’re going to thank me for this footage when you’re all old and wrinkly,”_ said Soledad.

 _“It’s a liability,”_ said Sombra, raising her hand.

 _“Oh come on–Not my camera–I just got—!”_ A bright pink skull emblem covered the video and it cut out to white noise before cutting out completely. 

Marti was hugging her knees. “She’s beautiful,” said Marti.

“And you take after her,  _linda,_ ” said Sombra, tucking some of Marti’s hair back, “…we’ve got a big day tomorrow. You need to rest.”

Marti glanced off, looking pensive.

“You can stay if you want,” said Widowmaker, already settling in to sleep. 

Marti’s eyes widened and she wriggled under the sheets between Sombra and Widowmaker. Sombra grabbed her an extra pillow. Eventually Marti fell asleep, gripping Sombra’s nightshirt in a white-knuckled grip. Sombra put her hand over Marti’s before sleep claimed her as well. 

—

Christmas morning, Marti was giggling as she ran around the living room, wearing her new AR headset that projected images of flower petals that would turn into butterflies when she got within sufficient range. It had other games, but that was the one she liked the most. Widowmaker and Sombra sat on their couch, sipping coffee amidst a mess of wrapping paper as Marti ran circles around them.

“I don’t know if that was in our budget,” said Widowmaker, watching as Marti sprang up to catch more unseen flower petals.

“Pffft. Budget. Good one,” said Sombra with a grin.

“Tch,” Widowmaker grinned, “Of course. Also, forgive me if I’m wrong, but…I don’t think that headset has even been released yet.”

“I know a guy,” said Sombra with a shrug, before quickly catching herself, “I mean–Santa knows a guy. A guy with a lot of secrets that won’t go well for him if they get out, so maybe he throws the odd AR headset prototype Santa’s way.”

“…I didn’t know Santa engaged in blackmail,” said Widowmaker. 

“Well… he knows who’s been naughty,” said Sombra, sipping her coffee. They watched as Marti ran past, giggling. “So… first Christmas. Think we did good?”

“I’d like to think so,” said Widowmaker, before kissing Sombra on the cheek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah. As I said, the continuity jumps around a bit. Marti (Short for Martina) is the daughter of a Los Muertos Gang member named Soledad who was a close friend of Sombra's. Marti's mother fled Los Muertos and an ex-boyfriend with the help of Sombra, but later found she was pregnant. She had Marti and they lived in relative peace for the first six years of Marti's life, until after Sombra and Widowmaker's defection. Then Talon sought out Soledad and her daughter to try and draw Sombra out from hiding. Soledad was killed in the conflict between Talon, Overwatch, and Los Muertos, and Sombra, being Marti's godmother, adopted her.


	10. Late Nights At the Lab

The Shimada-Ziegler family made a point of eating dinner in the mess hall that night–it was good to touch base with the rest of the watchpoint and not worry about cooking. Rei was five now, so of course there was the whole Watchpoint going on about how big she was getting and how she had Angela’s this and Genji’s that. And the other children were there, too. Rei tagged after Marti with the little Amari twins in tow, ducking under tables and trying to steal extra cookies from the kitchen. It was walking back to the apartment that Mercy suddenly remembered some lab results she meant to go over. Rei was riding on Genji’s shoulders then.

“I’ll take her back home,” said Genji.

“I want to go to the lab, too!” said Rei, “I won’t break anything!”

“It’s going to be very boring, Sunneschii,” said Mercy, reaching up to tuck some of Rei’s hair back.

“Please?” said Rei.

Mercy and Genji exchanged glances.

“Well it’s not bedtime yet,” said Genji.

 Genji really did mean to take her home at 9–the lab wasn’t exactly  _super_  child friendly, but Mercy had made the effort of making a little corner with a beanbag chair and a little play-table where Rei could draw, read her picture books, or play with her action figures while Mercy worked. There were scribbly crayon, colored pencil, and marker drawings on printer paper all over the lab now. They added a nice amount of color to the place. Rei was propping her head up with one hand while scribbling away at a new picture, chattering to herself quietly, slipping between english, German, and Japanese as she thought out loud about what colors to use next. 

Mercy and Genji themselves were talking, like they always used to do. It was nostalgic, being in the lab together after sundown. Rei’s chatter and the odd clatter of an action figure on her play table was a warming background noise, and at one point Rei did come up and quietly slide a piece of paper next to Mercy–a drawing of a purple-haired sorceress from her favorite Sentai show. Mercy took a brief break to pin it up on the wall among the other drawings before resuming her work. Rei went off and played with her action figures. There were a few more explosion sound effects in the background, but Mercy and Genji kept talking, barely noticing that the clatter of action figures and quiet but impassioned exclamations of  _“Heeeenshin!”_ and explosion sound effects were tapering off.

 Finally Mercy leaned back in her chair and stretched. “Well, that wasn’t so bad, and it’s only–” she glanced at the clock and her face dropped. “Eleven!?” she swiveled around to see Rei curled up in her beanbag chair, asleep with several action figures jammed under her arms and a book splayed across her. “Oh…” she said softly.

“Guess the mess hall tuckered her out more than we thought,” said Genji, stepping over and carefully picking her up.

“She should have said she was getting tired!” Mercy’s voice was a near-whisper, but she pressed a hand to her forehead, “No, this is my fault—we should have been keeping better track–”

“…I think she just wanted to spend time with you,” said Genji, smiling and readjusting Rei in his arms.

“I’m not doing anything interesting,” Mercy muttered, “It’s all just… dry and technical post-lab write-ups.”

“That never stopped me, did it?” said Genji.

Mercy smiled a little.

Rei grunted a little on his shoulder and Mercy bent and picked up Rei’s favorite action figure from the beanbag chair. “Let’s get her to bed,” said Mercy, tucking some of Rei’s hair back.


	11. Stargazing with Winston

Marti was lying flat on the roof with Rei sitting next to her as both of them stared up at the moon and the colony that etched itself out in concentric semicircles intersected with sharp straight lines on the moon’s surface.

“Do you miss it?” asked Marti.

“Mm?” Winston looked up from his telescope. He was wearing a headlamp to adjust it and both Rei and Marti flinched and covered their eyes as he turned his head in their direction. “Sorry–” he clicked the headlamp off.

“The lunar colony,” said Marti, “Do you miss it?”

“There are some things about it I miss,” said Winston, “The scientists, the other gorillas… they were my family for a long time until…” he trailed off, turned the headlamp back on, and turned his attention back to adjusting the telescope.

“Will you ever take us there?” asked Samir.

“It’s not exactly easy to get up there,” said Winston, “Or exactly safe on the colony itself….And we’d have to have a very good reason to go. Still… I’ve seen plenty of surprises in this lifetime, I’m not ruling anything out.”

“Are the gorillas ever going to come down here?” asked Rajeev.

“Personally, I think there’s way too many people down here for their liking,” said Winston, “Most of them, anyway. They should be fine though. Hydroponics and generators should hold up just fine.”

“You still worry about them?” said Marti.

“Well… it’s a complicated relationship,” said Winston.

The children fell quiet at this for a while, most of them still staring up at the stars, Samir looking between the sky and a star chart program on his tablet. 

“What’s that one?” said Rei, pointing at a star.

Winston glanced up from the telescope, turned off his headlamp and squinted at where Rei was pointing. “Arcturus,” he said, “It’s part of the spring triangle. Do you see the triangle?”

“I see the triangle!” Rajeev cut in.

“Along with,” Samir glanced down at his tablet and tapped a few things in, “Spica and regulus,” he read.

“Well that is correct, but you came out here to look at the actual stars, not a tablet,” said Winston.

Samir set the tablet down a bit sheepishly.

“Just a few more tweaks and…” Winston peeked through the telescope, “Ladies and gentlemen, we have calibration.”

“Ooh! Let me see!” Rei sprang to her feet and hurried to the telescope and looking into it.

“Now, the filter I put on the lens should make the GRS clearly visible,” said Winston, “But I can change the filter if you want a better look at the moons.”

“GRS?” said Rei.

“Great Red Spot,” said Winston.

“…do scientists just abbreviate things to keep them from sounding dumb?” asked Marti.

“Well I would say we abbreviate things to save time and make them sound  _cooler_  but..” Winston shrugged and adjusted his glasses before looking back at Rei, “Do you see it?”

“I see it! It’s a storm, right?” said Rei, stepping out of the way and letting Samir look into the telescope.

“A centuries-old storm, if the reports from the eighteenth century are to be believed. Since Jupiter’s a gas giant, there’s no planetary surface to create friction, nothing to oppose angular momentum, so gas can swirl for years and years.

Rajeev snorted, “Gas giant,” he mumbled as Samir stepped out of the way for him to look through the telescope.

“Well this gas giant has protected earth from its fair share of catastrophic meteors,” said Winston, “…and maybe slung some our way.” 

“No kidding?” said Marti.

“Well luckily we have Mars and our Moon and obviously the sun drawing a lot of the fire off of us too,” said Winston as Marti stepped up to the telescope. She looked into the telescope and squinted at the stripes on Jupiter’s surface.

“Do you ever want to go up there?” asked Marti as Winston looked through the telescope himself.

“Not much to go back to up there, and I have plenty of work to do down here,” said Winston.

“I don’t mean the lunar colony–I mean beyond all that. Further out,” said Marti.

“Maybe some day…” said Winston, “I read somewhere once that we–as in people–have never been satisfied to see events as unconnected and inexplicable. That we want to understand the underlying order in the world, the universe. I mean to be fair he also said time travel wasn’t possible and I kind of had to… break that postulate to make the chronal accelerator–so what I’m saying is, even here on earth everything’s changing. What we know and how we understand things is always changing. There’s still so much I have to figure out just here on earth, and when things seem to start falling into place, everything changes. We build off of what we know, but what we know about the world itself is changing just as much as we are—that makes the whole thing an adventure, doesn’t it?”

“We’re an adventure,” Rei said, smiling.

“Of course you are,” said Winston. There was a long period of silence where they took turns looking through the telescope, the rest of them looking up at the stars. 

“I want you kids to promise me something,” said Winston.

“Promise what?” said Marti.

“Promise me you’ll stay curious. You’ll keep asking questions.”

“Promise,” said Rei.

“Promise,” Rajeev and Samir said at the same time.

“Promise,” said Marti.

They stayed watching the stars for a few more minutes.

“Can you also promise me that none of you will go evil?” Winston added, “Athena says if Overwatch implodes again, my blood pressure is pretty much going to kill me.”

“Got it. Not going evil,” said Rei.

“Not going evil,” said Marti.

“Not going evil,” said Rajeev.

“Morality is relative. No promises,” said Samir, before Rajeev elbowed him hard, “Fine. Not going evil,” said Samir. 


	12. Watchpoint Scouts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Jack Babysits

“Jack, what did we tell you?” Sombra folded her arms.

“To watch the kids.”

“And how did we phrase it?”

“’Jack, you’re getting weird and obsessive again but you just end up getting depressed when we force you to take a break so we’re putting you on kid duty.’”

“So tell me what I’m looking at here,” said Sombra, gesturing at the hangar area below the walkway where they were standing.

In the shipping crate storage of the hangar, Rajeev appeared to be attempting to tie knots, and Marti and Samir seemed to be intensely focused on sewing with a hard-light sewing machine.

“…well-behaved kids developing valuable life skills?” guessed Jack.

“What did you do to them?” said Sombra, folding her arms, “And where’s Rei?”

“Well if I had to wager a guess…” Jack started but they heard the hammering of sneakered feet in the stairwell and Rei ran out onto the walkway, then buckled over panting before drawing herself up to her full height.

“I got them!” she said, holding up her tablet, “I got them!” she shoved the tablet in Jack’s face.

“Easy, kid,” said Jack, taking the tablet, “I’ll be the judge of that.” Sombra frowned and peeked over Jack’s shoulder as he calmly thumbed through a note document on the tablet featuring several photos of seagulls, macaques, a blurry picture of a dolphin’s fin, several different photos of crabs and beetles, and notes on each animal. “Seems pretty solid to me,” said Jack, “And you took all the pictures yourself?” 

“Master Zenyatta pointed out the dolphin to me. Does that still count?” said Rei.

“Yeah, still counts,” said Jack, rifling through his pockets, “Well scout, looks like you’ve managed to earn your Wildlife Identification badge.” He pulled a badge out from his pocket and handed it to Rei, who was eagerly bouncing up and down on her heels and took it from him. “Thank you, sir!” she said, saluting, “I’m going to go assist the elderly now!”

“Don’t tell them they’re elderly while you’re assisting them,” said Jack.

“Yes sir!” said Rei, running off.

Jack rifled through his pockets again and pulled out several badges, frowning at them as Sombra glared at him while he calmly sorted out the badges in his palm.

“I’m sorry,” said Sombra bringing her hands up, “’Scout?’ Did you just call her ‘Scout?’”

“Yeah,” said Jack, pocketing the badges again, “What about it?”

“We all agreed we weren’t going to railroad these kids into working for Overwatch,” said Sombra, “We agreed on it as soon as Rei was born.”

“And we’re not,” said Jack, looking back down at Marti and the twins, “They still want structure though. You have to admit it’s kind of alienating that they live on this Watchpoint but out of principle we can’t really have them act like a part of this Watchpoint like we are. So… Watchpoint Scouts is just a chance for enrichment and building some skills that are generally useful. No one’s getting railroaded into Overwatch.”

“’Watchpoint Scouts?’” Sombra repeated, arching an eyebrow.

“Well it’s not JuniorWatch, so I’m not calling it that,” said Jack.

“Wait-wait-wait— _JuniorWatch?_ ” said Sombra.

“It was a Crisis-Era youth program designed specifically for orphaned refugees… it offered structure, socialization, and skill training to help them survive what they had gone through and… prepare them in case things got worse,” Jack looked down at Rajeev frowning at a crooked sheet bend knot, “Turns out the end of the world doesn’t seem as bad if you frame it like a summer camp.”

“That’s fucked,” said Sombra.

“The Crisis was a fucked time,” said Jack with a shrug, “Of course, JuniorWatch was decommissioned after the crisis. Broke back down into local youth scouting troops, that sort of thing. Turns out you can still just… 3-D print the badges though.”

“Right, right,” Sombra said, furrowing her brow and rolling her eyes, “You still need uniforms to sew those badges onto.”

“Not full uniforms,” said Jack.

“Mr. Morrison! Mr. Morrison!” Samir and Marti ran up with several armfuls of cloth, “Do we get our badges now?”

“Well that remains to be seen,” said Jack, taking one cloth from Samir’s arms and turning it over,. Sombra’ s eyes widened to see he was holding sashes. Proper sashes.

“Hm… good stitching,” said Jack, looking at the seams, “I’d say four sashes is more than enough for a tailoring badge ” he pulled two badges from his pocket and handed them over to Samir and Marti, who beamed and ran off, looping their sashes over themselves.

“…that’s devious,” said Sombra.

“That,” said Jack, “Is delegation. One of the first things you learn to do when you’re strike commander.”

Sombra scoffed.

“So,” said Jack, “Have I just forfeited kid duty forever for indoctrinating the children with… sewing and wildlife photography?”

“Nnnoo but you may have just bought yourself several afternoons of Friendship-Bracelet-Weaving hell,” she said folding her arms, “Just make sure  _this_  little organization doesn’t go down in flames like your last one.”

“You know I can’t promise anything like that with these kids,” said Jack.

“Well it’s good to see Marti excited about something, at least… she likes you, you know? Don’t let her down,” said Sombra, walking off.

“She’s a good kid,” said Jack after her. 

—

Rajeev was still frowning over several nylon chords as Sombra walked past him. She stopped and squatted next to him, looking over his shoulder. Rajeev tugged at his crooked knot and then sighed as it came apart. “Here,” Sombra reached forward and guided his hands, “Rabbit comes out of the hole, around the tree, and under the root.” 

Rajeev pulled the knot and the two lines tightened together and Rajeev’s face lit up, “Easy, right?” said Sombra, standing up and continuing to walk out of the hangar, before pausing at the doorway. She looked back at Jack over her shoulder, who had seen the whole knot-tying, and gave a small salute before walking out.


	13. Symmarah Fam at Blizzard World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which I Spend A Stupid Amount of Time Researching Games I Don't Even Play For One-Off References

“I don’t understand half of these references,” said Satya, tilting her head at the park map she was projecting out of her prosthetics, “What  _is_  Snaxramas? Why would anyone want to eat something called ‘Death Wings?’”

Pharah made an ‘I dunno’ noise with her mouth full of wings. 

“The boys have been standing in line for an autograph of that… thing… for twenty minutes now, and I don’t even know why,” muttered Satya.

The twins themselves looked perfectly content, chattering away in their murloc hats in line.

“Everyone loves Selendis,” said Pharah with a shrug as she swallowed her deathwings.

“I don’t even know why I agreed to wear this stupid thing,” she said, readjusting her perpetually lopsided Princess Talanji headdress.

“Because you look beautiful,” said Pharah.

“Really?”

“No, you look ridiculous, but also it’s easier to see you if we lose each other in the crowd,” said Pharah, kissing Satya on the forehead.

“Don’t make me curse you,” said Satya before pausing and saying, “That’s what she does, right? Curses?”

“I mean… Kind of? Basically?” said Pharah with a shrug.

Satya scoffed and looked back at the Selendis as the twins finally made their way to the front of the line. 

“Now… what have we here?” the almost-unsettlingly tall costumed character stooped over the twins, the reverb on the voice suggested that there was an omnic underneath the mask.“Strong,” Selendis looked at Rajeev, “And clever, too,” she looked at Samir, “Yes… you will serve the Protoss Empire well. Yes…. we must record this….” 

“Is that good?” said Satya, “Do… we want them to serve the Protoss Empire?”

“Not really,” said Pharah with a smile.

“Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom!” The twins’ voices overlapped each other and they waved feverishly at Pharah and Satya. 

Pharah snickered as she brought up her camera.

 Pharah brought up her camera, “All right, scooch in—”

The twins moved in close next to Selendis.

“Now, children say, ‘I will restore Order!’” said the Selendis costumed character. 

“’I will restore order!’” Rajeev and Samir said at the same time, striking poses as Pharah took photos of them.

“Now go forth! Destiny commands you!” announced Selendis as the twins moved away from her to allow the next children in line to take their photos with her.

“C’mon! C’mon!” Rajeev grabbed Pharah’s wrist and began pulling her away from the Pylon terrace, “We gotta get to the Hatchery!”

“Hatchery?” repeated Satya.

“Petting zoo,” said Pharah.

“Ah,” said Satya as the twins ran on ahead.

“’I will restore order?’” said Satya, “I like her…”

“Everyone loves Selendis,” said Pharah as they walked after the twins.


	14. A Symmarah Fam Mothers' Day

Satya’s prosthetic buzzed on the bedside table and she grunted in her sleep as Pharah’s alarm went off on the other side. She rolled over and did her best to groggily reach for her arm as Pharah’s eyes blearily opened and she sat up in bed, smacking her lips to try and get the taste of sleep out of her mouth. There was arguing in the kitchen and Pharah flopped back against the pillows.

“Mother’s day,” she said, glancing over at Satya and kissing her on the cheek as Satya managed to drag her prosthetic off of the bedside table.

“ _Please_  tell me the boys haven’t set the kitchen on fire again,” said Satya, plugging her prosthetic into her shoulder, her body flinching slightly as the nerves connected. 

“They didn’t set the kitchen on fire last year,” said Pharah, smiling and kissing Satya’s shoulder blade.

“No, they just set off the smoke alarm. At 7 AM,” said Satya.

“Well what’s important is we  _almost_  got dosas,” said Pharah as there came a clang of a pan and more bickering from the kitchen, “They’ve gotten a lot better about it.” 

Satya tried to be comforted by these words. True, she had seen the twins manage to make plenty of quesadillas, hard-boiled eggs, couscous, and simple vegetable stir fries under her and Pharah’s supervision, so they could trust the boys to safely work with a stove, but last year’s Mother’s day’s attempt was enough to fill her with dread at the aspect of them being in the kitchen without her and Pharah watching now.

“They’re destroying our kitchen,” said Satya as Pharah took her into her arms.

“Mm,” said Pharah, kissing the point of Satya’s shoulder where her skin met her prosthetic.

“They’re going to put the wrong spoon in the wrong drawer and it’s going to take us 45 minutes to un-jam it,” said Satya.

“Mm,” Pharah kissed the point where Satya’s neck and shoulder met.

“They’ve probably fermented the batter wrong and we’re all going to be fighting over the bathroom 20 minutes after breakfast,” said Satya.

“Mm,” Pharah managed to turn Satya onto her back and kissed her collarbone.

“They’re going to get batter  _everywhere_  and try to clean it up but not clean it up all the way and it’s going to form that–that crusty  _paste_  on the countertop.”

“Mm,” Pharah was kissing her way up Satya’s neck.

“Somehow there’s going to be a new stain on the ceiling and–Mmh…”

Pharah finally made her way up to Satya’s mouth and kissed her.

“Happy Mothers’ Day,” said Pharah.

“We need to stop them,” said Satya, tucking some of Pharah’s hair back.

“I like their little breakfast in bed thing!” said Pharah, “It’s sweet… and it’s nice they’re trying to be independent.”

“Well yes, back when it was Lúcio-O’s…” said Satya, “They get this ambition from you, you know.”

“And they get their cooking from Grandma,” said Pharah, smirking.

Satya visibly shuddered. “That’s cruel. They’re only 8, you know. They have time to learn. Avoid her path.”

“So let them learn,” said Pharah, smiling. That smile quickly turned pained as another clang sounded from the kitchen. Pharah pushed herself up from Satya and glanced toward the door of the bedroom, “Maybe we should–”

The door opened and both Samir and Rajeev shuffled in, both still in their pajamas with crusty white smears of dosa batter on the cuffs of their sleeves and dotting down the fronts of their shirts. An additional smear of dosa batter was streaked across Rajeev’s cheek and clumped into a lock of his shoulder-length hair. He looked fiercely proud holding up a plate piled high with a pile of dosas, ranging on a spectrum of barely-cooked white to practically blackened, but most seemed to be at a comfortable in-between of golden brown. They looked.. actually edible. Pharah and Satya exchanged glances, equally impressed and terrified at what the kitchen might look like.

“Happy Mot–” both the twins started.

“Did you turn the stove off?!” the question fell out of Satya and Pharah at the same time.

“Yes,” said Samir rolling his eyes.

“Happy Mothers’ Day!” Rajeev held up the plate of dosas high with a couple ramekins of mint and mango chutney.

“Oh–” Satya smiled, “They look wonderful. Thank you.”

“We only burned three this year!” said Rajeev, “ _I_ did most of the work.”

Pharah and Satya exchanged glances before Pharah, used to years of her own mother’s abysmal cooking, hesitantly took a dosa, dipped it in some chutney and took a bite. Her eyes lit up.

“It’s good,” she said incredulously, before catching herself and looking at Rajeev, “I mean–Of  _course_  it’s good!” she ruffled Rajeev’s hair and he giggled, “Nothing but the best from…” Pharah kept ruffling his hair and was now not-so-subtly trying to pick the clump of dosa batter out of Rajeev’s hair, “My little… adventurer..” 

“Oh–also!” Samir suddenly ran out of the room and ran back in with Satya’s old training Hard-light projector around his wrist. He pointed to Satya’s headset on the bedside table. “Can I–?”

Satya pushed herself up in bed, picked up the headpiece and held it out to him as he walked over to her side of the bed, helping straighten it as he fit it on his head. The visor flickered into existence over his eyes and he pressed his thumbs and forefingers together and drew upward. Eight lines webbed outward aside from the line of hard-light drawn between his fingers.

“You finally got the hang of the radial symmetry function,” Satya’s voice was tight with emotion, and Samir’s eyes lit up. It only took a few gestures to set a geometric pattern of interlocking 90-degree angles between the radials, forming a near mandala shape. Satya pressed her hands together in front of her, her gold eyes sparkling. Pharah watched, dipping rolled-up dosas in chutney and smiling watching Satya and Samir as Samir continued poking at the hard-light schematic illuminating from his projector.

 Samir grinned, set his fingertips against it and turned it, stretching out more lines from the ends of the radials. then made a conical shape with his fingers and pulled downward, pulling the mandala fro two dimensions to three, before turning it and, apparently satisfied, flicked his wrist and let the hard light solidify into a clunky white trumpet flower shape. He held it up to Satya. Satya took it her eyes wide and shining.

“I’ve been practicing,” said Samir.

“So you have,” said Satya, a clear shake to her voice.

“Are you going to cry?” said Pharah, smiling and taking another bite of dosa.

“No–” Satya’s voice was on the verge of breaking, her eyes wet and gleaming before she cupped her hands to the sides of Samir’s face and littered his forehead and cheeks with kisses.

“Oh–Mom–Gross–!” Samir snickered under every peck. Pharah laughed and set the plate of dosas on the bedside table before looking at Rajeev. She grinned. 

“Rah!” she scooped Rajeev up in her arms and dragged him up onto the bed, giving him a playful noogie as he shrieked and laughed before she kissed him on the temple. After a bit the laughing died down and Pharah smoothed out Rajeev’s hair before kissing his forehead and looking at Samir.

“You two really mean the world to us, you know that, right?” said Pharah, flaking some of the dried dosa batter off of Rajeev’s cheek with her thumb.

Samir and Rajeev nodded. “You’re the world to us too,” said Samir.

Satya took a sharp inhale, trying to keep tears back.

“And you’re  _sure_  you turned the stove off?” she asked, her voice cracking.

“Mom!” Rajeev and Samir said at the same time.


	15. Jack and Marti

“Were you wearing it when you got them?” asked Marti, sitting cross-legged in the stool at Jack’s worktable, sitting opposite the table from Jack.

“Got what?” said Jack.

Marti traced one finger down diagonally across her face, trailing from above her left eyebrow to her right cheek, then again over the side of her mouth, miming out the same spots where Jack’s scars were.

Jack huffed and glanced back down at the tactical visor in his hands. He was tweaking it slightly. Nothing too permanent.  “No. Got the scars in Zurich. The visor came… a little later. Technically this one’s a reject.”

“A reject?” repeated Marti.

“Well… prototype’s probably closer. The old one I had… lost that one in the blast…” he trailed off but then caught himself, “The old one didn’t protect the face as much but… well… the UN thought the rumors of America’s SEP program were scary enough  _without_  my face covered. They wanted people to see my face. See I was human. They said it gave people hope, let people know that it was possible for humans to defeat the omnics, kept panics down. I suppose it looked better on the posters, too,” Jack itched at the scar that ran over his mouth, “The old tactical visor was smaller…more focused on one eye. I prefer this one…doesn’t mess with my depth perception as much.” 

“And it covers your face?” ventured Marti.

Jack snickered, “Is it that bad?”

Marti shook her head. 

“Yeah protection and the whole ‘secret identity’ thing… that didn’t hurt either,” said Jack, squinting and holding the tactical visor at arm’s length before giving a nod and holding it over to Marti. 

Marti glanced down at visor. “Are you sure it’s okay?”

“You asked, didn’t you? It’s survived a lot worse than you. Don’t worry,” said Jack. Marti moved to put it on. “Just don’t keep it activated for more than a few seconds. Damn thing always gave me migraines when I kept it fully activated for too long.” 

Marti nodded and put it on. She clicked something on the side of it and it activated, highlighting targets, analyzing the environment, easily adapting to the smallest movements of her own eyes. “Woah…” she said quietly. She looked at her own hand through it and then looked at Jack. She made a finger gun at Jack, “ _I’ve got you in my sights,_ ” she said, imitating his raspy voice. Jack dramatically slapped his hands over a spot on his chest and buckled over with a grunt. Marti snickered.

“I don’t really sound like that, do I?” said Jack, still hunched over.

“You sound like you gargle nails in the morning,” said Marti, deactivating the tactical visor and taking it off. It started off as a slight ache at her temples but as soon as her eyes adjusted to not having the visor on, it went into a full-blown headache. She groaned and pressed her hand to her forehead.

“I told you,” said Jack, getting back upright, “Headaches. I don’t think humans are meant to take in that much visual information at once. Drink some juice or water and give it 10 minutes and you should be fine.” 

Marti handed the visor back to him, her hand still on her forehead. “I think it looks better on you, anyway,” she said, forcing a smile.

“What can I say?” said Jack, leaning back in his chair and re-calibrating the visor back to his specifications, “Still got it.”


	16. Fledgling

“Sunneschii, this will go by faster if you hold still–” Mercy was folding and unfolding the mechanical alula of Rei’s wing as Rei was struggling to look over her own shoulders. Mercy was suited up in her full valkyrie suit, but Rei was wearing one of the gray and orange Watchpoint training jumpsuits.

“Are they lit up yet?” asked Rei, “Can I change the color or does it always have to be yellow? When can I fly?”

“No, Yes–to the color changing, not the yellow, and we’re going to be focusing on the descent mechanic before we do any flying,” said Mercy, “All birds have to learn to fall before they can fly. Like the ducks we saw in that documentary.”

Rei rolled her eyes. “I’m not a duck, I’m a dragon,” she said, folding her arms.

“Of course,” Mercy bent and kissed her on the cheek before testing the folding mechanics of Rei’s wings one last time and pressing down at a catch of the wing harness between Rei’s shoulder-blades. Rei gave a slight jump and both wings unfolded with a ’Shhv’ sound and a small burst of yellow feather-shaped lights. “All the same,” said Mercy, “Falling comes first.” 

Rei looked over her shoulder at the small wing frames jutting out from her back. 

“It’s linked up to your nervous system. They’ll respond like extra limbs,” said Mercy, “But not flapping–folding and unfolding, and shifting for direction. Give it a few tries.”

Rei took a deep breath and closed her eyes. The wings suddenly sprung out wide from her back, throwing her balance off suddenly, Rei flailed hard and the wings clacked back in hard enough to make her flinch.

“…a few more tries,” said Mercy putting an encouraging hand on her shoulder. 

Rei gave a single nod and held her hands open in front of herself. “Extra limbs,” she said, balling her hands into fists. She opened her fists with an inhale and the wings unfolded, then an inhale, curling her fingers back into fists and letting the wings fold with them. She opened her eyes and gave a glance to Mercy.

“Okay,” said Rei.

“Shipping crates,” said Mercy, pointing at a small stepladder braced against two stacked shipping crates.

“Moooom,” Rei said with an eye roll.

“We start small,” said Mercy folding her arms.

“The ducks jumped off from two stories in the documentary,” muttered Rei, climbing up the ladder onto the shipping crates.

“You’re not a duck, you’re a dragon,” said Mercy with a smirk as Rei looked over the edge of the shipping crates and jumped off.

Her wings unfolded easily but the distance between the top of the crate and the floor of the hangar was so short that it was only two or three seconds longer with the angelic descent of the wings in full effect.

“Again,” said Mercy.

“But I got it!” said Rei.

“Again,” said Mercy.

Rei huffed and climbed on atop the shipping containers and jumped off, the wings catching her again.

“Again,” said Mercy.

Rei rolled her eyes climbed up and jumped off, the wings not opening as fast this time and Rei stumbling into a run on the ground to catch herself.

“Again,” said Mercy.

This continued for several minutes with Rei getting a better and better feel for the wings, but clearly looking more and more frustrated with each ‘Again.’

“Wonderful,” said Mercy, “If you need a few more minutes to practice with it–”

“No–I want to go for it,” said Rei.

“Are you sure?” asked Mercy.

“ _Mom_ ,” Rei huffed, exasperated.

“All right,” said Mercy, leading Rei out of the hangar. She took Rei’s forearm in a firm grasp, “Ready?”

Rei gave a nod and Mercy pushed off the ground in flight, pulling Rei up with her as they shot through the air up onto the walkway between the watchpoint comm towers. The wind rifled through both of their hair and the late afternoon sun of Gibraltar shined orange over the sea. 

“Heeeeyy!” Genji called up from below, waving his camera at them.

Mercy smiled and waved.

“Did I miss it!?” Genji called up.

“Mom just made me jump off crates!” Rei yelled back down, “It was boring!”

“Hey!” said Mercy.

“Well, she’s the expert!” Genji yelled back up.

“I am,” said Mercy, folding her arms, “And there’s a big difference between this and some shipping crates.

Rei huffed and then looked out over the edge and found that yes, the ground was very far below them, so far below them that she couldn’t really bring herself to retort about that. Mercy was right. There was a big difference between this and crates.

“If you want to head back down and practice jumping off of shipping crates in the hangar more–” Mercy started.

“Mom–I’ve got this,” said Rei. She looked down to the cement below. “Were you scared?” she asked.

“I probably should have been more scared,” said Mercy with a huff, “At the time, I just cared about something that would get me to my team and other injured people as fast as possible. And that first flight…” Mercy’s eyes trailed skyward. 

“I’m ready,” said Rei.

“You’re sure?” asked Mercy.

“I’m sure,” said Rei.

Mercy took her forearm in that firm grasp again. “Just a bit more of a drop than off the crates, that’s all. Don’t focus on the fall, focus on the wings,” said Mercy.

“Okay,” said Rei.

“On three,” said Mercy, “One, two…” she took a steadying breath for herself and Rei felt her squeeze her arm a bit. “Three!”

They both leapt off of the walkway and Rei dropped like a stone but on reflex Mercy kept her grip on Rei’s forearm as she spread her own valkyrie wings. A cry escaped Rei as she dipped hard. Mercy’s wings were slowing both their fall, but it was still a shock.  “It’s okay!” said Mercy, “I’ve got you. The wings, not the fall. The wings, not the fall.”

Rei inhaled and her wings unfolded and she went from dangling from her mother’s forearm to slowly gliding down with her own Valkyrie wings spread.

Mercy folded and unfolded her wings to dip down slightly so that she and Rei were at the same level. “Are you all right?” she asked.

Rei was panting a little from the spike of adrenaline of nearly falling.”Yeah… yeah, I’m all right. Just gotta time that better…”  she said as they both landed.

“You’re sure you’re all right?” said Mercy, releasing Rei’s arm.

 Rei circled her wrist from Mercy’s grip, “Yeah…You’re really strong, Mom.”

“You’re telling me,” said Genji, walking up to them and pulling them both in to a tight hug, “That was great!”

“I fell,” said Rei,

“Only a little,” said Mercy, “We can try again if you like, but if that was too much–”

“I want to try again,” said Rei.

Mercy gave a nod, took her arm and flew her up to the walkway again.

“On three?” said Mercy, “One–”

Rei let go of Mercy’s arm and leapt off the edge.

“Rei!” Mercy and Genji both said in alarm and Mercy moved to snatch her as she pushed out but Rei caught herself with her wings just as easily as she had done with jumping off the crates. Rei looked down at the ground slowly coming to meet her feet and she flailed her legs in the air slightly, a breathless laugh escaping her. Mercy huffed and leapt off the walkway and swiftly glided over to her.

“Don’t scare me like that!” said Mercy.

“I want to be able to do this by myself!” said Rei, still floating downward.

“Letting you make your own mistakes and learn from them is fine when it’s school or cooking or anything else, but this is  _flight_ , Rei, there’s no room for mistakes! I know we’re protective of you living on this Watchpoint and it’s exciting because this is a new freedom but you don’t know how to–” Mercy looked at Rei up and down, still floating perfectly calmly toward the ground. Rei had folded her arms and was doing the thing her father did where they would wait patiently for someone on a manic rant to finish. “…Okay, so you have the descent mechanic down,” she conceded. 

“Everything all right up there!?” Genji shouted up from the ground, still a ways beneath them.

“We’re fine!” Mercy called back down before turning to Rei, “Please don’t do something that rash again.”

“I won’t but… you have to trust me too,” said Rei.

Mercy pursed her lips.

“I can do this,” said Rei.

 A long pause passed between them filled only with the rush of wind and the whir of both their valkyrie wings.

Mercy huffed. “Fine but–don’t be afraid to ask for help. The thing about flight is that it’s a lot easier to get in over your head than you think.”

 “So can I fly now?” said Rei, “Like actually fly?”

Mercy pursed her lips for a few moments. “Well that depends,” she said, her wings suddenly blazing out on either side of her as she released Rei’s arm and flew up and back several yards, “Can you?”

Rei gave a glance to her wings, then back to Mercy, still drifting away, wings blazing and falling further away with Rei’s own descent.  _They respond to your nervous system,_ she remembered. She looked at the light streaming off of her wings, then made eye contact with her mother.  _Forward_ , she thought.

Rei hurtled forward and practically body-slammed Mercy at the waist. “Sorry! Sorry!” Rei blurted out as Mercy took hold of her shoulders to stabilize her in the air. 

“Good–” Mercy was breathless at having the wind knocked out of her, “That was good!”

“You mean it?”

“Well you’ll need more practice of course but you’re already treating the wings as an extension of yourself,” said Mercy.

“Like a sword!” said Rei, pushing off of Mercy and letting herself dip and zip around, swooping down and zipping back up to her again, using gravity to build up momentum for herself.

“Y-yes…” Mercy was hesitant at this comparison, “In a sense…Just… try to follow me some more.” 

There were several minutes of them zipping among the comm towers of the watchpoint, catching themselves and drifting downwards before Rei would zoom towards her again. There was a smile on Rei’s face as she would let the wings fold in, sprint across the roof of the watchpoint armor array, then leap off and sweep toward her, managing to catch up to her but not ram into her this time.

“Good?” said Rei, drifting around Mercy.

“Good,” said Mercy, reaching forward and tucking some of Rei’s hair back. 

Rei grinned and broke away from her. She turned over in a flip in mid air, flailing her arms to keep balance. 

Mercy caught a chuckle in her throat. “Just like your father,” she said quietly.

“Oh!” Rei suddenly perked up, “Dad!”

“Sunneschii–” Mercy started after her but Rei was already shooting toward her father’s silvery figure on the ground, she barely managed to stop herself before slamming into him like she did her mother.

“Dad!” Rei dipped around Genji and grabbed his forearm, “Come on!”

“I think it’s going to be a couple of years before you can lift me–” Genji started but Mercy swooped in, grabbed Genji’s other arm and before he could protest they both pulled him into the air.

“Woah–!” he looked down at the ground falling away beneath him, then looked up to see his wife and daughter on either arm, holding him tight. Rei’s face was flushed, thrilled. Mercy’s was warm, smiling–they had done this a million times before.

“Mom, can I–?” Rei started

“Of course,” said Mercy. She looked at Genji, “I’ve got him.”

Mercy dipped and hauled Genji’s arm over her shoulder before extending her wings again and catching herself. Rei hesitantly released Genji’s hand and Genji found himself braced by one arm across Mercy’s shoulders, before she brought her now-free hand under him and was holding him bridal style.

“Well this is familiar,” said Genji, looking at Mercy, “You  _are_  strong, you know.”

Mercy chuckled before looking out at Rei flying around. Rei was letting herself fall and catching herself before shooting upward and arcing backward, a cormorant-like silhouette against the sun-gold light off the sea. Anxiety was twisting in Mercy’s stomach at how far out she was, but Rei took to the air like she was made for it, and Mercy knew she would catch her if she ever fell.

“She really does have the hang of it,” said Mercy, watching Rei bank along the cliff line of the watchpoint. 

“Well why wouldn’t she?” said Genji, “She’s your daughter, isn’t she?”

Rei swept back toward them and past them, arcing back towards the comm towers of the watchpoint and suddenly planting her feet against the wall and running up vertically up it, her wings blazing behind her. before she shoved off hard and spread her wings into a back dive before catching herself again. Cocky, overcompensating, definitely, but there was a joy and genuine talent in her. A spacial awareness perhaps honed by her training with her father and uncle. Rei zipped around her and Genji one last time before banking back towards the comm towers. The wind off the sea had whipped her hair into a voluminous blaze of dark tangles stiffened by salt. she landed back up on the walkway between the comm towers and waved at them, all bright smiles and dark eyelashes.

“That she got from you,” said Mercy.

“Ah, so  _that’s_  why you worry about her so much,” said Genji.

Mercy just snickered and kissed Genji on the cheek.


	17. Rei and Zenyatta

The night air was cold and further chilled by the wind off the sea as Rei hugged her knees, feeling the cold easily sink through the thin cloth of her robe and pajamas. She sat on a shipping container facing the sea, and the cold of the metal had pretty much left her butt numb at this point, but she tried to ignore that. She closed her eyes and tried to listen to the waves. The dream came back to her in flashes: she was trying to run but finding her legs stupid and unresponsive, she was trying to scream but no sound came out, and then the fires came and consumed everything. A shudder ran through her and she wasn’t sure if it was the cold or the sight of her parents consumed by flames. It wasn’t real, she told herself, Dreams are just the mind turning its wheels at night, nightmares are just when those wheels get gunked up with anxiety. It was a cloudy night, or cloudy early morning–she didn’t want to look at the time. She bowed her head, touching her forehead to her knees, then heard a whirring through the air. She brought her head up to see a yellow-gold light shining on her, and heard a gentle chiming next to her. She glanced up to see a sunny yellow sphere floating in the air about a foot and a half above her.

She sighed and shut her eyes, “I’m not hurt, Master.”

“I know. I sense disquiet in your soul,” a voice spoke behind her.

Zenyatta gently floated up alongside her and lowered himself to the surface of the shipping container alongside her.

“In spite of all your time among the Shambali, you are not an omnic, Rei,” Zenyatta said, “You must sleep like everyone else.”

“I  _was_  sleeping,” said Rei, “I just…” she trailed off.

“Nightmares?” questioned Zenyatta. Rei nodded and Zenyatta made a noise that was imitative of a sigh, but since he didn’t actually have to breathe, served more to offer understanding and the indication that this was not the first time he had heard of such a problem. “Not uncommon in your family, I’m afraid,” he said.

“I know,” said Rei, “…Have… have you ever been really scared that you could lose the people you love?”

“Once, a long time ago, I lost the person I loved more than anyone else in the world at the time,” said Zenyatta.

Rei’s stomach tightened in knots as she remembered Mondatta. “Oh  _scheisse_ –I’m sorry– I didn’t mean— I mean I know you—”

“It’s fine,” said Zenyatta, “I feel my brother in the warmth of the Iris, and in all I hope to accomplish in this life, I hope to feel his heart guiding my hand. In spite of our differences toward the end, I know we did believe the same things,” he plucked one of his orbs from where it circled around him, and stared at it, as if it might have a better answer in it, “But then again I’ve had 16 years to cope.”

Rei huffed, “I guess it’s kind of stupid to be freaking out about something that might not even happen, huh?” she said, tucking her bangs back from her face.

“Your family has known loss and pain. Your mother lost her parents when she was only a child, then when she seemed to have a family again, it collapsed. Your father was destroyed by and in turn destroyed his family. Your uncles have known loss and pain, inflicted by their own hands as well as others. You represent something new for all of them. Little by little, this new Overwatch shaped itself into a family, and then you came into the picture, and suddenly this ramshackle family has a future that it needs to protect.”

Rei huffed, “No pressure or anything,” she said with a slight eye roll.

“It’s only natural that there would be a lot of anxiety on all sides when it comes to that,” said Zenyatta, “But… from what I have observed… you are growing. You are getting stronger and wiser, and it’s a wonderful sight to see you forge your path.”

“What if it’s not enough though?” said Rei, “What if  _I’m_  not enough?”

“You aren’t enough,” said Zenyatta, simply.

Rei’s brow furrowed.

“But that is the point,” Zenyatta continued, “No single person is enough. It takes many people of many different experiences to come together and build the world they want to see.” Zenyatta looked away from her and out to the sea, “And I suppose, that is the middle ground where Mondatta’s and my philosophies meet. Even when we experience loss, those we love have a way of finding their way back into our lives.” Zenyatta reached a hand out and touched her shoulder, “You are not alone in this, Rei, and you never will be.”

There was silence between them for a few beats, filled only with the sound of waves. 

“Thanks,” said Rei. She shuddered and sneezed.

“You should get inside before you catch co–” Zenyatta started but suddenly found himself in a tight hug from the girl, “Oh,” he said. 

“I’m glad you’re my family too,” said Rei, her voice reverberating slightly against the metal of his frame.

“As am I,” said Zenyatta. He patted her back as she tightened the embrace for a second before letting him go.


	18. Marti and McCree

Marti sat on the observation deck, watching the training grounds below. Night had only just fallen, but there was a glow about it, and eager chatter coming from below. Too far to make out the individual words, only drifting up as an excited buzz.

“Not joining the celebration?” a voice came from behind her. She turned and glanced over her shoulder.

“I could say the same to you,” she said, sitting up a bit as McCree plopped down next to her, “I mean, aren’t you like… her uncle or something?”

“Been hitched 8 years now. Give a man more credit than ‘Or something.’” said McCree.

“That’s still not answering the question. Why aren’t you down there?” said Marti.

“Rei wondered where you went,” said McCree.

 Marti frowned, watching as Rei grinned and gestured to her family excitedly. “Yeah she seems real broken up about it,” said Marti.

“Cut her some slack. Not every day you summon a dragon for the first time,” said McCree. 

“I know, I know,” muttered Marti. She was quiet for a long time. “I’m a terrible person.”

“What now?” said McCree, sitting up a little.

“She never shut up about that stupid dragon. ‘When I get my dragon, I’m going to do this.’ ‘Just wait til I get my dragon’ ‘I hope my dragon’s really big.’ She would be just… sitting out in the cold up in that monastery trying to make that stupid dragon appear and all I could think of was how funny it would be and how dumb she would feel when she realized she was just as normal as me.”

“Rei doesn’t think you’re normal,” said McCree.

“That’s the worst part,” said Marti, “’I want to be cool like Marti.’ ‘Marti you’re so smart.’ ‘Marti look at this.’ ‘Marti, Look at me.’ ‘Am I cool now, Marti?’ I mean… it’s not as bad as when we were little but… it’s still there.”

McCree snickered, “Well… that’s how it is sometimes. You’re the closest thing she has to a big sister, you know.”

“I didn’t want to be anyone’s big sister,” said Marti, “I just… came here and here she was and… and she thinks I’m like, this great person but I just keep catching myself wishing she wasn’t…” Marti trailed off, “I don’t know.” Marti hugged her knees, “I know I’m not supposed to be here.”

“Aw geez, don’t start with that,” McCree took his hat off.

“I’m serious,” said Marti.

“ _I’m_  serious,” said McCree, running a hand through his hair. He exhaled. “Y’know this is the point where I’d roll myself a cigarette but since Rei popped out I swore I wouldn’t smoke around a kid. But damn,” he rubbed the back of his neck, “You tell Sombra or Widow about this? How you feel this way?”

Marti bit the inside of her lip. “They’ve got enough to worry about.”

“They worry about  _you_ , that’s what they worry about,” said McCree, “All of us do.  _I_  do. Because you’re here with us and we’ve got your back. There’s no ‘supposed to’ about it.”

Something like a smile tugged at the corner of Marti’s mouth. 

McCree exhaled, “Look, I was the same way for a long time—I can’t imagine what it’s like at your age—wait–” he snorted, “Y’know it just hit me—you’re only a year younger than I was when I joined.”

Marti blinked a few times.

“Well…’joined’ isn’t exactly the right word,” McCree went on, “It was this or prison. And then I left, shit fell apart, and then by the time I joined back up all Overwatch activity was deemed illegal by the UN. Funny how life works like that.”

“Maybe you just like being an outlaw,” said Marti.

McCree put his hat back on and tipped it to her. Marti snickered.

“I… I am glad I’ve gotten to meet everyone,” said Marti, scratching at the baby hairs on her temple, “I love my aunts. I  _am_  glad I’m here it’s just… I don’t know…”

“Well… if it helps, I don’t think people join Overwatch because they necessarily belong in Overwatch. I feel like people join Overwatch because they don’t belong anywhere else,” he paused, “Then again that’s coming from the guy who had a bounty on his head as soon as he left so…”

Marti laughed. 

“You’re gonna figure your shit out one day, kid,” said McCree, leaning back a bit, “Maybe it’ll be with us, maybe it’ll be somewhere else, but you’ll figure it out. When you do, it’ll be just as much of a sight to see as any dragon. If not more.”

Marti sat there for a few seconds, stunned. “I–uh…” she fidgeted with one of her braids, “Thanks.”

“Anytime,” said McCree, “Look–you ever need to talk, feel free to let me know.”

“Okay,” said Marti.

 McCree stood up. “Well… I’d better be getting back myself. Uncle duties and all. You want to come with or should I tell them you’re tired?”

“I think I need a bit more time,” said Marti.

“Fair enough,” said McCree, turning to walk back down. There was a span of a few seconds of silence while McCree was walking away, when Marti spoke again.

“Terah, Arizona,” said Marti, suddenly. McCree stopped walking.

“Beg pardon?” he said, turning on his heel.

“Oljato Cantina in Terah, Arizona—that one’s you, isn’t it?” said Marti.

McCree arched an eyebrow.

“’Say Joel sent me?’” said Marti.

McCree’s eyebrows raised and he rubbed his forehead. “Sombra’s just being safe, is all.”

Marti pursed her lips for a few seconds before saying, “I’m glad you’re one of the contingency plans.”

McCree chuckled. “I, personally, am honored to be one of your Auntie’s contingency plans.” He gave her another tip of his hat, before turning around, “You take care, kid.”

“You too,” said Marti.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The "Contingency plans" Marti is talking about is referring to an old ask I got [here.](http://nitewrighter.tumblr.com/post/162651712963/would-marti-ever-think-that-sombra-would-go-back)


	19. Moira and Aedan

“You’re up awfully late,” Moira leaned against the doorway.

Aedan was staring at multiple monitors, scrolling through various files on Amélie Lacroix. He looked over his shoulder at her. “I’m going to ask you a series of questions, and you’re going to answer them truthfully,” he said, closing one of the windows and turning around in his chair.

“I have the distinct feeling you already know the answers,” said Moira, walking over and pulling up a chair in front of him.

“I want to hear it from you,” said Aedan, his brow furrowing.

“Very well,” said Moira.

“Thomas Faraday—the sperm donor—there’s no such person, is there?” said Aedan.

“No,” said Moira.

“There’s no sperm donor at all,” said Aedan.

“No sperm donor,” said Moira.

Aedan’s mouth tightened to a thin line. “So I’m… I’m cl—I’m…”

“A clone, yes,” said Moira, “Well… not technically. A clone is an exact copy. Obviously,” she gestured at him, “You’ve been edited. Tweaked, as it were. But in the regards that I grew you from my own cells in a lab, yes, you’re a clone.” 

Aedan looked down. “So the things I remember…They’ve been written in,” he stared at her, “So what  _is_  true?”

“The past four years—-all true. You’ve… only existed for about seven years, and only conscious for four of them,” said Moira, “You’ve been aged artificially, memories written into your hippocampus via the same technology you’re currently looking up. The process took three years. It was far more… elegant than what we did with LaCroix. I did my best to give you a childhood that correlated to the events of the past 14 years and Talon’s… lifestyle… with minimal trauma.”

“And so I would continue your work,” said Aedan.

Moira shook her head. “Genes can only take you so far. To be honest it was a gamble—I, after all, came from perfectly ordinary people. It was just as likely you could have been an ordinary person. But your talents, Aedan, your abilities—I didn’t write that. That was you.”

“And how do I know you’re not lying about that?” said Aedan, furrowing his brows.

“Because you know yourself just as well as I know myself,” said Moira, “And by extension, you know me as well as you know yourself. We have that much in common, at least.”

Aedan kept a steady glare on her. Moira sighed.

“In the end,” she said,  “People have children for selfish reasons. Despite all the carrying on about ‘love,’ we have children because we, as humans, are inherently flawed and selfish creatures who fear death. Part of my reason for having you—”

“Making me,” said Aedan.

“Part of it was fear for my own work and my legacy, yes,” said Moira, “But I knew I was making a person. In spite of what most like to think about me, I never lost sight of that.”

“And part of it was to see if you could,” said Aedan.

“All I could ever give you was my best, Aedan,” said Moira, touching the side of his face, “You represent the pinnacle of my work. A great step forward in human evolution where every other scientist would fear to tread—but,” she brought her hand down from his face and clasped his hands in hers, “What thrills me even more, the future I can’t wait to see, is the one  _you_  build.”

 Aedan was quiet, staring at her hands around his. 

“And… who knows, maybe your will will differ from mine,” said Moira, “I accept that possibility. Embrace it, even.” She took a deep breath, “I knew we’d have this conversation sooner or later. There’s little trust to spare in Talon as it stands, but I don’t do anything without a purpose or simply to prove I can,” she gave his hands a slight squeeze, “From this point forward, there’s full disclosure. Anything you want to know, I will tell you. Science is about truth, happy childhoods be damned.”

Aedan’s eyes scanned over the purplish veins trailing over Moira’s right hand. “I…” he started, his eyes flicking up to hers, “I need to think.”

“Of course,” Moira withdrew her hands from his, “You know how to reach me,” she said, rising to her feet. She walked toward the door.

“Oh–um–” Aedan started and Moira paused in the doorway, looking over her shoulder at him.

“…should I still call you ‘Mum?’” asked Aedan.

“If you so desire,  _a thaisce,”_  said Moira with a smile, before walking out the door.


	20. Omnic GF

Marti was talking with her mouth half-full of torta. “So then I realized my multimeter was totally off, so I’m going to have to re-calibrate the whole thing and meanwhile Fawkes just keeps saying ‘Duct tape, we need some duct tape’ but he says that  _all the time_  and poor Ebo is pretty much dead in the water with the opposing team’s bot heading toward him and–Rei?” 

Rei didn’t respond. She was looking off. Marti followed Rei’s line of sight across the blacktop to a group of girls all chatting cordially. Rei was staring. It was, frankly, embarrassing how much she was staring. The one she was staring at was a willowy Omnic in their school uniform, though of course, for the Omnic’s own tastes she matched a headscarf to the blue of her jumper, and wore some sweatpants underneath the skirt. 

“You’re going to have to talk to her one of these days instead of staring at her like a fish,” said Marti, taking another bite of her sandwich.

“I’ll just say something dumb,” said Rei, still staring.

“You say dumb things all the time,” said Marti with a roll of her eyes, “I mean she might as well know what she’s in for.”

“Well I mean it’s easy for you!” said Rei a bit grumpily, “You’re all..  _pretty_  and you’re  _cool_ –”

“I’m not cool. I just realized stuff is going to suck at this age for a long time for us,” said Marti with a shrug before taking another bite of torta, “Probably going to mess me up in the long run but hey, what hasn’t?”

“She’s like.. the smartest girl in the whole school…” Rei said quietly.

“…Rei, her brain is literally a computer,” said Marti, “Just… talk to her.”

Rei sullenly turned back to her bento, bitterly picking apart her spinach rice dragon. 

Marti huffed. “This is depressing and I don’t need this,” she said, setting her torta aside and grabbing Rei’s bento box away.

“Hey–!” Rei started but Marti grabbed Rei’s arm and pulled her to her feet.

“Marti–” Rei started.

Marti kept walking.

“Marti please—” Rei said quietly.

“We’re doing this,” said Marti, with Rei’s wrist in an iron grip.

“Don’t force me to use my training on you!” Rei said, increasingly desperate as they drew closer and closer to the group of girls, “I have training! I’ll use it! I have training! Marti _, please_ — _Marti I’ve been eating spinach._ ”

Marti stopped at this and glanced over her shoulder at Rei. 

“Teeth,” she said. Rei half smiled half-grimaced.

“You’re good,” said Marti, continuing to drag her forward. The bell rang and the group of girls broke apart, leaving the omnic who was looking at her phone.

A distressed wail was muffled in Rei’s throat when Marti suddenly stopped, stepped around Rei, and put her hands on Rei’s shoulders.

“Go get ‘em, tiger,” said Marti. With that she shoved Rei forward. Rei stumbled forward a few steps and then found herself next to the omnic girl.

 The omnic glanced up from her phone. “…can I help you?” she asked. 

“Hi?” said Rei.

“…Hi,” said the Omnic.

Rei felt herself break a sweat when suddenly the omnic snapped her fingers.

“Oh! You! You’re one of those kids from the watchpoint, right?”

“We’re not violating the Petras Act!” Rei said out of reflex then bit her lip and glanced off, “I mean–Yeah. Watchpoint. Yeah.”

Something like a chuckle escaped the omnic. “We haven’t talked. I’m Jaz-RE.”

“…Rei Ziegler,” said Rei.

The second bell rang.

“Well… I’ll see you in class then?” said Jaz-RE.

“…see you in class,” said Rei as the omnic hurried off.

Rei stood there awkwardly on the the blacktop then ran a hand through her hair. “ _Scheisse…_ ” she muttered.


	21. Rei vs. Doomfist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Doomfist is 2 for 2 on Wrecking The Shimada Family's Shit

One of the valkyrie wings lay twisted and broken in the snow, the remaining stump where the wing had been ripped off sporadically firing off sparks. The tip of the tantō only scratched the surface of the gauntlet, but still she stabbed at it, her legs flailing and kicking as he gripped her. She stabbed again and again, grunting. The gauntlet easily gripped her upper torso, and she had one hand uselessly trying to pry a finger back and break the unbreakable grip and the other still stabbing at the gauntlet. .

“Just call for your father,” said Doomfist, “There is no way this ends well.”

Rei slashed out at him with the tantō but the blade didn’t even reach his face when he held her at arm’s length, she was breathing heavy, half-panicked, she resumed stabbing at the gauntlet harder, “ _I-don’t-care,_ ” she said with gritted teeth in-between stabs.

He half sighed, half chuckled before pulling her closer. Instinctively she went for his head with the tantō but he easily caught and gripped her wrist with his free hand and with one squeeze forced her to drop it. “I need you to understand, little dragon, I have nothing to gain from killing you. Six or seven years, perhaps, with your speed, you might provide a challenge, doubtful, but I have been impressed before.”

“We’ll stop you,” Rei said, now struggling to get her other arm free. She knew she couldn’t.  _Keep him talking,_ she thought,  _keep him focused on you. Keep buying time until the monastery’s evacuated._ “You haven’t gotten your war yet,” she said, “You never will. People are better than that. They’re not weak like you say they—-”

“There’s that Ziegler streak,” Doomfist said the name almost with admiration in his voice, “Let me tell you something about your mother,” Rei reddened with fury but Doomfist looked at her straight in the eyes. “Your mother is not a pacifist,” he said, “She is a survivor. I think you already know the difference between the two.”

Rei’s mouth tightened and she suddenly head-butted him hard, then just as quickly grunted and reeled back in pain, a dark bruise now forming on her forehead. A sputter of a laugh escaped Doomfist, clearly unaffected by the head-butt.

“You have spirit, I’ll give you that much,” he said. Her vision was swimming from her own blow. “But I’m afraid spirit only takes you so far.” He threw her on the word ‘far’ and she hurtled through the air and bounced several times across the snowy ground of the village, each impact sending up white puffs of powder in her wake, until she smashed through a wicker windbreak and came to a rolling stop in a snowdrift. She was still for a moment, partially buried in the snow, snowflakes dappling her dark hair and the broken wing stump of her valkyrie harness still firing off sparks. Doomfist kept his eyes fixed on her, waiting, then she groaned and stirred.

“Still conscious,” he said, slightly impressed. She was trying to struggle back up, but couldn’t seem to will the strength to her limbs. “Don’t get up.”

Rei managed to get to her hands and knees before collapsing in a puff of snow again with a grunt.

“A valiant distraction,” said Doomfist, turning around and walking toward the monastery, “But meaningless.”

_“He’s goading you,”_  the sensible voice in Rei’s head said,  _“He’s trying to bait out the dragon. Don’t fall for it.”_  But another voice, the voice that had gotten her into this mess in the first place, said,  _“His back is turned. Save the monastery. Buy time. Kick his ass. Kick his ass. Call the dragon and kick his ass.”_  But her limbs still didn’t seem to be listening to her.

“A beautiful temple,” Doomfist said, walking away from her, and towards the monastery, “But I’m afraid for this world to evolve, the Shambali must fall.” 

“No–” Rei struggled up to her hands and knees, but her vision was fading at the peripheries, “You can’t—”

A wall of blue light suddenly appeared in front of her.

“Rei Shimada-Ziegler, you have sustained injuries. For optimum chance of survival, please stay behind the barrier.”

“What…?” Rei looked over her shoulder.

Orisa came forward from the main gates of the monastery. “My apologies for not arriving sooner, but you were instructed to evacuate,” said Orisa.

“…I can explain,” said Rei. There was a beat then Rei blacked out, falling unconscious, face-first in the snow.

—-

Rei’s head was still aching when she came to, she then had to squint and cover her eyes, groaning from the brightness of the biotic fields as well as the caduceus staff. Her fingertips brushed up against something on her forehead. Bandages. Her eyes flicked around. She was on the Orca. She was at an angle where she couldn’t see out the window, but the hum told her they were in the air. Her eyes flicked over to Marti curled up in one of the seats in the corner of the orca. Trying to sleep, or maybe pretending to sleep and eavesdropping. She wouldn’t be surprised either way.

“Eyes open,” said Mercy, leaning forward and examining Rei’s eyes. She gave a short sigh of relief. 

“It was exhaustion–” Genji started.

“I’m not ruling out concussion until we’re back at the watchpoint,” said Mercy, folding her arms.

“Even if it was concussion, the dragon and the biotics—” Genji started reassuringly.

“Genji,” Mercy spoke his name sharply and Genji fell quiet. Mercy inhaled through her nose and exhaled through her mouth, pulling her arms tight around herself.

“…are you mad?” said Rei.

“You were told to evacuate,” said Mercy, rubbing her forehead, “What were you  _thinking!?_ ”

“… I wasn’t..” Rei said quietly, “I mean…I was… I couldn’t just let him–” Rei suddenly caught herself, “The monastery!” she sat up but then grunted and put a hand to her head as the blood rushed from it.

“Easy!” Genji said, putting a hand on her shoulder to stabilize her.

“The monastery,” Rei said again, “What happened–?”

“Orisa was able to drive him off. The Monastery itself suffered heavy damages but… it’s still standing. Everyone got out fine,” said Genji. He brushed a thumb over the bandage wrapped around Rei’s forehead, “Well… almost everyone.” He exhaled, “Rei, you can’t do something like that again. What if he saw the dragon?”

“I couldn’t just run…” Rei said quietly.

“I’ve faced him with far more years of training than you and a  _team,_  and I was still lucky to have  _survived,_ ” said Genji, “And he’s been continuing to augment himself over all these years, he’s just as dangerous as he was before you were born, if not more so.”

“This isn’t your fight, Rei, it’s ours,” said Mercy, “It should have ended, but it hasn’t, and we can’t–”

“It’s my fight too!” said Rei. Mercy flinched back slightly at the outburst. Rei huffed. “I know you don’t want it to be… but it’s my fight too. The monastery–it’s my home too…”

Mercy bit the inside of her lip and closed her eyes. “Rei–if anything happened to you…” she trailed off and then exhaled.

“Just… you’re still learning,” said Genji, “You can’t go jumping into another fight like that. If we tell you to run, Rei, you  _run_. Do you understand?”

Rei was quiet.

“Rei, do you understand?” Genji repeated.

Rei nodded. 

Genji huffed and patted her shoulder. “You should get some rest. We’ll be at the watchpoint soon.”

—

“She gets it from you, you know,” said Mercy, staring out the window of the orca as Rei slept in a biotic field.

Genji put an arm around Mercy’s shoulders. “Me? I was just an idiot when I was her age. The heroic-instinct-bordering-on-suicidal-martyr impulse? Where have I seen that before?”

Mercy scoffed and elbowed Genji a little. They were both quiet, staring at the clouds outside the orca window. “We owe her a better world than this,” said Mercy.

“And we deserved a better world than the one we were born into,” said Genji with a shrug, “I think it’s all we can do to make sure she grows into a good person.”

Mercy smiled a little. “She is a good person. She got that much from you, at least.” 

“You too,” said Genji, pulling her in a little closer and kissing her on the temple.

They stood in silence a bit more.

“…we should probably put more work into the ‘making sure she doesn’t get herself killed’ thing,” said Mercy.

“Probably,” said Genji.


	22. Marti vs. Reaper

They made eye contact only briefly. There had been no security breach. No alarms. Nothing. He had only entered the room, glanced down to see two of their security guards knocked out on either side of the door, then glanced up and there the figure was, suspended by cables from an air duct about a foot above the talon data terminal. The figure was in all-black tactical gear, almost reminded him of Blackwatch, but with blue highlights on the armor rather than red. The figure turned their head toward him. Three bright blue lenses of trifocal goggles gleamed at him, the figure’s nose and mouth were covered by a black mask that went down their neck, and any hair they might have had was hidden under a fitted black beanie.

 The figure glanced back to the screen of the terminal, where a loading bar was filling up. Reaper looked at the terminal to see a blue data extractor stabbed into the side of the terminal’s server.

_Talon tech,_  thought Reaper.

 He drew both his guns. Instantly the figure planted both of their boots on the base of the terminal and shoved off hard with their legs, swinging on the cables. Reaper fired, flak piercing the walls behind the black-clad figure as they swung about the chamber, barely outpacing Reaper’s shots. Their boots smacked against the walls of the chambers and they sprinted along the walls, supported by the cables as they drew something from their back—not quite a gun, not quite a crossbow–and fired at him. He ducked out of the way of a bright blue charge that pierced into the wall and sparked behind him. The figure shoved off the wall again, Reaper tracked their movements and aimed his gun, then at the last minute they hit a panel on a belt on their hip and both the cables detached from their belt, and they rolled across the floor and suddenly disappeared before he could fire.

“ _Thermoptic cloaking?_ ” thought Reaper. He pivoted on his heel, listening for anything. 

“You can’t hide,” said Reaper, pacing about the chamber, “And that cloaking doesn’t last forev—”

There was a blue flash and Reaper grunted as an electric charge hit him in the side. A not-quite human sound escaped him as electricity coursed through him and he reached out a clawed hand and managed to grab the beanie off of the figure’s head as the cloaking faded off of them, and he suddenly felt his own claws tangled in dark hair as the figure shrieked. 

“You shouldn’t go running around in a mask, kid,” said Reaper.

He saw a flash of something as the figure grabbed something off their belt, then there were more blue sparks in the corner of his eye–a baton–and suddenly his whole field of vision went white and red from the pain of shock as the figure broke out of his grip. He looked at his side, flesh knitting itself back together from smoke. 

“ _Mierda…_ ” he heard a voice. Girl. Yucatán accent, but not Sombra. Couldn’t be. Wasn’t pitched right. He looked up at the figure, staring at him through those bright blue trifocal goggles, her baton sparking blue at her side. Her face was still obscured, but the black braid, messy and loosened by his claws hung over her shoulder. There was a steadiness with the way she looked at him through those goggles. “It’s only gotten worse, hasn’t it?” she said. Pity–Was that  _pity_  in her voice? Reflexively he raised his gun. Between the SEP serum and everything Moira had pumped into him, he wasn’t about to be taken for some pitiful old man.

 More shotgun fire spackled the walls as Reaper fired after the would-be data thief. The thief returned fire, but apparently the one shot the thief got in was a lucky one. She was missing every shot. Finally her odd not-a-gun-but-not-a-crossbow-either weapon clicked and she swore. He fired at her and she tumbled out of the way again before hitting something on her belt. Another cable shot out and she suddenly shot off of her feet and was swinging around the chamber. She shoved off of the walls and was flying toward him, baton sparking in hand. He moved to fire on her, but there was the click of an empty chamber and he was forced to turn to smoke to keep from getting shocked again. She phased through him, then hit a button on her belt and shot upward as Reaper drew another gun from his cloak, one of his shots grazed the thief and she grunted, but kept up her ascent. She knew his moves, he realized, as he shot at her. She was putting in plenty of distance to keep the shotguns from being effective, yet baiting him all the more. His blood boiled. He steadied his arm and shot the cable above her and she was tumbling down before she fired off another cable and caught herself, swinging hard into a rappel against the wall of the chamber.

“How much cable do you  _have?!_ ” said Reaper.

“How many guns do  _you_  have?” she shot back.

Reaper snarled and drew another gun, firing off at her as she rappelled and leapt, expertly detaching and firing off new cables in mid air to dodge his fire, ascending higher and higher in the chamber. With all her dodging and running along the walls, she could head back to her her air ducts, he realized, she was sticking around for the data. His eyes flicked to the terminal. He just needed to get the data extractor. Simple enough. He ran for the terminal and found himself stopped short. He moved his arm, found it caught as well. Then he took a step back. He pressed forward with an open palm and felt the pressure of a chord across it. There was the whir of thermoptic cloaking fading away and he took a step back and saw it. Cables. Dozens of them, strung tight across the walls of the chamber like an old laser security system. 

“…you weren’t aiming for me,” said Reaper. 

“No, I wasn’t,” said the thief, turning her electrified baton on so that it was emitting a high pitched noise now. There was a ‘ping’ noise and Reaper glanced to the terminal. The bar was full. The data extractor had finished.

“And that’s my cue,” said the thief. She touched the end of her baton, now a flare of electricity, to the lattice of cables and everything went blinding. Sparks went everywhere. Jumping between the cables. Jumping through Reaper. It felt like every cell in his body was screaming. Then the lights went dead. Reaper’s head was a haze of pain but somewhere he could hear the whir of cables as the thief descended from ceiling.

Reaper coughed, nanites rising off of his body like smoke. He flinched as a spark ran over him. Through him. The girl was panting, she pulled her mask down to breathe easier, then pushed the goggles up onto her forehead before walking over and picking her beanie up from the ground. Reaper saw her face as she stooped to pick up the hat.

“You,” Reaper coughed.

“Hey Gabe,” said Marti, glancing over her shoulder at him.

Reaper stared at her a second. “How old are you now?” he said.

“Nineteen,” said Marti.

“Nineteen… I’m getting too goddamn old for this,” Gabe muttered mostly to himself before looking at her again, “Who sent you?”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Marti, walking back to the terminal and grabbing the data extractor off of it.

“Sombra and Widow don’t know… do they? They’d never let you here…” Reaper rasped. There was a pause. “Jack,” said Reaper, “It has to be Jack.”

“I said don’t worry about it,” said Marti, pocketing the extractor on her belt.

 “They’re not a family you know,” said Reaper.

Marti paused and glanced over toward him.

“Widow. Sombra. Overwatch. You want them to be a family, to be  _your_  family, so badly,” said Reaper, “But you know they’re not.”

“Jack said you’d get like this,” said Marti, grabbing the cable near the air duct that she had detached from at the beginning of their fight and attaching it to her belt.

“Is that what Jack’s doing these days? Sending kids to fight me?” said Reaper.

“I volunteered,” said Marti.

“This isn’t your fight,” said Reaper, his body wasn’t responding to him. He had to get up. 

“Talon made this my fight thirteen years ago,” said Marti, “The difference is now I can do something about it,” Marti hit a button on her belt and the cable started pulling her upward back into the ceiling duct, “Goodbye, Gabe.”

The alarms kicked in as soon as she disappeared into the ducts. Reaper struggled up to a half kneeling position and picked up a piece of burnt out cable.

“Of course you’d take after them,” muttered Reaper as Talon guards charged into the room in response to the alarms. 


	23. Horus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Rajeev Lost An Eye

Samir’s mouth was drawn to a thin line and he was hunched over, his legs dangling over the edge of the watchpoint observation deck. The sound of ocean wind and the distant cry of seagulls was suddenly cut with the clink of ice cubes in plastic and the slurping of a straw. Samir glanced over to his left, where Rajeev sat next to him as he so often did, irritatingly getting out the last few drops of a passion tea and lemonade with some sustained stubborn slurps through the straw.

“Does it hurt?” asked Samir.

 Rajeev turned his head, revealing the white gauze that completely covered his left eye–or at least where his left eye once was.

“Not really. It aches, kind of,” said Rajeev, “But I’ll be honest I’m on like… a  _stupid_ amount of painkillers right now. They’ll be able to fit in the new prosthetic pretty soon though.”

“…you didn’t have to do that,” Samir said softly.

“What now?” said Rajeev.

“You didn’t have to  _do_  that. You could have just—you could have—” Samir’s voice was stiff, but shaking, 

“…let her kill you?” said Rajeev.

“I don’t know,” said Samir, “You never think. You’re always rushing in. You always—” Samir cut himself off and bit the inside of his lip.

“Look, if there was another way to do it at the time, I didn’t see it–I didn’t have time to, and no, I didn’t think. I’ll say that much. But you were…” he trailed off and was quiet for a few beats. “You’re my little brother,” he said, “I’ve got to look after you.” 

“I’m eleven minutes younger, you  _dick,_ ” Samir’s voice cracked on the word ‘dick’ and he inhaled sharply through his nose, trying to keep the tears from bubbling up.

“…‘Course I can only look after you about half as much now,” said Rajeev. He looked over at Samir with an expectant grin.

 Samir’s jaw was hanging open, his eyes still red and tearstrained. 

 “Oh come on I’ve been waiting to use that for like… 3 days,” said Rajeev. 

“You’re a dick,” Samir said, a half-sob half sputter of a laugh escaping him. The tears finally seemed to break waterline of his eyes but he quickly wiped them off.

“Yeah I know,” said Rajeev, he brought an arm around Samir’s shoulders. They watched the seagulls out over the water. “Glad you’re still here though.”

“I’m glad too,” said Samir.


	24. When Rei met Aedan

The crowds made Oasis hotter, safer feeling, but hotter. Mercy furrowed her brow at a conference flier as the three of them sat on a bench in the city center. The crowd itself was an odd enough bunch for them to blend in. The heat sinks in Genji’s shoulders steamed as he fanned himself with his own flier. Rei had peeled off one of her gladiator sandals and was circling her foot at the ankle, touching at the not-yet-a-blister-but-definitely-will-be forming just below her medial malleolus.

“Well with Efi’s Q&A and the Shambali panel over, I suppose the rest of the conference is fair game,” said Mercy, not really looking up from the flier, “Pharah did say Helix tends to put out a good floor show of their drones…”

“I wanted to see the gardens,” said Rei, looking up from her foot, “The tour guide on the tram said all the wintering birds would be there.”

“The gardens?” Mercy gave a glance back to the flier, “Those aren’t really a part of the conference,” she said.

“We could split up,” said Rei, “I have my comm.”

Mercy’s mouth drew to a thin line. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” she said.

“Ugh,” Rei slumped against the wall behind their bench, “I’m not a baby,” she muttered.

“Neither were Rajeev and Samir,” said Mercy, “Oasis looks glamorous,  _Sunneschii_ , but—”

“But it’s dangerous,” said Rei, with a sigh, “Everything’s always dangerous and if it’s not Talon, it’s the Shimada Clan, and if it’s not the Shimada clan, it’s Vishkar, and if it’s not Vishkar, it’s Junkers and if it’s not Junkers, it’s Talon and on and on and on.”

Mercy and Genji exchanged glances.

“What’s the point of all that training if I can’t go off alone?” said Rei.

“You’re on your own plenty—” Mercy started.

“Well yeah, in Gibraltar, but everywhere else…” Rei huffed, “Let’s just get to that Helix floor show,” she said bitterly.

Genji looked at Mercy. “Well… she does have her comm…” said Genji slowly, he made eye contact with Rei, “..and training.”

Rei’s eyes lit up.

“…and it’s not like we’ll be too far,” said Genji.

“True,” Mercy said quietly, but doubt still tugged at the corner of her  mouth.

“But—” Genji added, looking at Rei, “She would have to promise that if she sees anything–if she even gets a bad feeling, she needs to get out of there and call us immediately. We’re not letting anything happen like back in Nepal,” he looked at Rei, “Do you understand?”

Rei nodded.

Mercy took a breath. “Fine,” she said, looking at Rei, “You can go to the gardens. But you have to promise.”

“Promise!” said Rei, springing to her feet, “No fighting Doomfist. No stupid stunts. No big scenes. Things get bad and I run and call you. Promise.”

With that she ran off. For a moment Mercy thought she heard Rei give a second yell of “Promise!” but it was hard to tell against the din of the crowd. She exhaled, and then felt a hand on her shoulder. She glanced over at Genji.

“She can handle herself,” Genji said with a smile, “Don’t worry.”

“I’ll try not to…” Mercy said quietly.

“Well,” Genji chuckled and shrugged, “What’s—”

“Please don’t say ‘what’s the worst that can happen,’” said Mercy.

—

A voice spoke over the speakers spread around the Abu Hassoun gardens as Rei took photos of lotuses floating around one of the irrigation creeks that ran through the gardens in a carefully planned, mathematically sound delta. The voice on the speakers would speak in Arabic, then Kurdish, then Chinese, then Spanish, then English, then Hindu, and so on. The long march through various languages led to Rei tuning it out, maybe catching the word ‘Conservation’ here in English, ‘Hydroponics’ in Japanese there, as she took a picture of a eurasian teal and her ducklings heading through the irrigation creek. There were only a few people in the gardens, what few there were were only moving through, getting to the speedrail tram or their cars, or to the shuttles back to the hotels.

Wintering birds in and of themselves were an all right excuse, but the truth was, Rei just wanted to go to where the crowds were thinned. She would have called it ‘fresh air’ but she wondered if such a thing existed in Oasis’s heat. She pulled the wide-brimmed straw hat from her head and ran her hand through her thick dark hair, doing her best to try and evenly distribute the sweat and oil she could feel gathering at the brim of her hat with her fingers. Something pale darted out of sight in the corner of her eye and instinctively she turned toward the movement, but saw only the narrow, spiky-grass-like leaves of an iris plant.

“Hm,” she shook her hair out before putting her hat back on and stepped toward the iris plant, waited for a few beats. Nothing. She turned her attention to her yellow sundress now, pinching at the back of its bodice with her thumbs and forefingers and unsticking it from her sweaty back. The sprinkler system misted overhead as she straightened the flouncy straps of her dress–then the Iris nearby rustled once again. She turned sharply towards it this time, now positive that there was something there and it wasn’t a trick of the light or heat. She reached a hand and jostled the blades of the iris plant. She craned her neck slightly and saw a white shape, then a red eye blinked at her. A nose twitched. A rabbit. Too portly to be one of the wild hares around here, and an albino at that.

“Someone must have lost you, huh?” said Rei.

The rabbit shot out from behind the plant and sprinted past her ankles.

“Hey!” Rei ran after it. While it was a devil to keep up with, its white fur made it easy to track, visually. She sprinted after it, running through garden paths, dodging through crowds, leaping over irrigation beds and bounding over garden blocks, before the rabbit made a sharp turn onto a sidewalk, then ran under a velvet rope into a building.

“Oh for—” Rei skidded to a halt in front of the velvet rope and glanced up at a sign over the building’s doorway. The sign was in Arabic, of course, but it didn’t seem particularly foreboding. After all, it was ‘velvet rope’ off-limits, not ‘barbed wire’ off-limits. She stepped over the rope and continued her pursuit of the rabbit. Just grab the rabbit, get out, get the rabbit to a shelter, easy enough. The interior of the building was considerably dimmer than outside, but Rei found it a welcome change not to be squinting in Oasis’s sun. The very floor beneath her was lit pale blue, casting the whole building, with its silver and cobalt walls, in a cool, computer-glow-like light. Any signs saying what the building was for and who was in it were in arabic, though A few steps into the building and the air conditioning hit her and seemed to fill her lungs with real air, and she took a breath before seeing movement in the corner of her eye once again and turning to see the rabbit now at the end of the hall. The rabbit was staring at her with those pink-red eyes and Rei slowed to a walk to approach it. “Okay,” she said softly.

“Moving closer,” said Rei, stepping forward.

The rabbit didn’t move.

“This is me being non-threatening,” said Rei, slowly moving closer.

The rabbit continued to not move.

“Just…moving toward you… non-threateningly,” Rei spoke gently.

The rabbit still did not move. Rei was now about an arm’s length from it.

“Okay,” said Rei, lowering herself slightly, “Okay–”

The rabbit took off in a shot again.

“Seriously!?” said Rei hurrying after it down another hall.

“Hey!” she heard a shout behind her, and noticed two security guards on her tail, bickering with each other in arabic as they ran after her.

“Don’t make a scene,” Rei muttered to herself, “Sorry, mom…” she said, as she picked up speed.

“It’s okay!” She shouted over her shoulder to them, “I’m just–I just need to grab a rabbit!”

“What?” one of them shouted after her.

The guards turned a corner of the halls after her only to find an empty hall.

“!كانت هنا فقط” said one.

“…السياح الغبيون” said the other, “.وقالت انها يجب أن اتخذت الطريق الآخر”

The two guards turned around and headed down an opposite hall. A few seconds passed before Rei silently dropped down from where she had wedged herself between wall and ceiling. “ _Technically not making a scene,_ ” she thought. She rolled her shoulders, straightened out her sundress, and continued her pursuit, turning the corner to see the rabbit had apparently taken a moment to scratch an itch. Without hesitation she leapt, stumbled, scooped it up into a tight grip in her arms, and returned to a standing position. “Gotcha,” she said with a grin. The rabbit didn’t seem to fight her that much, apparently being used to being handled by humans. “All right… who do you belong to?” she said, getting a more secure and supportive grip on the rabbit. The rabbit’s head suddenly perked up, ears pricking up.

“Hey it’s okay I’m not—” Rei started but then she heard it. Singing. She couldn’t really make out the lyrics, but she glanced down to the rabbit, then walked toward the source of the music. And then the lyrics came through, fragmentary at first, but considering how little english you heard Oasis, it was unmistakeable

_“I still don’t know what I was waiting for_  
And my time was running wild  
A million dead-end streets _”_

Rei’s brow furrowed as she kept walking toward the source of the music.

_“Every time I thought I’d got it made  
It seemed the taste was not so sweet—_ _”_

Rei pushed through the door and the song hit her full on, as she walked into a lab. It had a clean, almost home-y antiseptic smell, and the walls were full of monitors featuring models of double helixes and cells dividing over and over and over again. and she saw a narrow figure partially hidden by large panes of glass.

“ _So I turned myself to face me  
But Iii’ve never caught a glimpse…_”

 The figure stepped, or rather danced into full view from behind the glass pane, revealing himself to be a rail-thin redheaded boy in a labcoat sporting a massive pair of headphones on his head. He bobbed and strutted and pelvic-thrusted to music she could not hear, while carrying a tray of what looked to be picotiter plates. He set the tray on the lab counter before pivoting on his heel with a jerk of his hips to a beat contained to his headphones, continuing to sing.

_“Of how the oth-ers must seeee the faker  
_ _I’m much too fast to take that test–”_

It probably would have been a good idea to hide, but the thought didn’t really occur to Rei as she stood there, holding the rabbit. She watched as the boy, clearly in some kind of scientific rockstar fantasy world of his own making,  grabbed a micropipette from one of the lab counters and used it as an impromptu microphone for the chorus, craning his neck back and full on belting out the song at this point.

_“Ch-ch-ch-changes!  
_ _Turn and face the strange!  
_ _Ch-ch-change–_ AUGH!” He twirled and caught her in the corner of his eye and his song turned to a squawk as he flinched hard, fumbling with the micropipette and only barely manage to snatch it spinning from the air as he straightened up his posture and stared at her. Rei wondered, for a beat, if this was one of the situations that called for running. 

“Who are–” the boy started awkwardly loudly, then caught himself, grabbed his music player off his hip and pressed a button on it before pulling his headphones off and speaking in a normal volume, “How did you get in here?”

“I–I um–” Rei glanced down at the rabbit.

“Wh–why do you have Creggan?” said the boy.

“What’s a ‘Creggan?’” said Rei.

“That’s my rabbit–” the boy started when the door opened behind Rei and the two security guards Rei had shaken off.

“There you are–!” said one of the guards, stepping forward and grabbing Rei’s arm, before looking up at the boy and speaking to him, “,اعتذارنا يا سيدي”

“,لا بأس” The boy blurted out and the guards gave him an odd look, “,إنها صديق” the boy assured them, “.انها خطأي، كان ينبغي أن أعطيت لها إزالة”

The guard holding Rei’s arm released it and muttered something under his breath to the other guard and they both walked off. 

“..what did you say to them?” said Rei.

“That you’re a friend,” said the boy.

Rei’s eyebrows raised.

“I mean.. not to presume just–You went through the trouble of bringing me back Creggan—”

“What kind of name is ‘Creggan?’” said Rei.

“That’s  _his_  name,” said the boy, holding his arms out towards the rabbit.

 Rei gave a wary glance to one of the monitors where one microbe seemed to be devouring another. “He’s not one of your lab animals, is he?”

“No, he’s practically family,” said the boy.

Rei gave a glance down to the rabbit, who seemed unafraid of the boy and quite relaxed, then warily handed the rabbit over.

“He’s good, most of the time,” said the boy, turning on his heel and walking over to a large hutch and securing the rabbit in it, “He has a bad habit of… exploring, where he ought not to, though.”

“Maybe your singing scared him off,” said Rei.

“Ah-heh-…uh… how much of that did you hear?” said the boy, rubbing the back of his head, his freckles nearly disappearing with his reddening face.

“Enough,” said Rei with a smile, “I’m kidding. It’s–it’s good. Really.”

“Right…You’re…” he chuckled a little, “You’re really good at sneaking up on people, aren’t you?”

“Ninja,” said Rei with a grin, doing a slight chopping motion with her hand.

“Of course you are,” said the boy, with a snicker. He stuck his hand out. “Aedan,” he said.

Rei shook his hand. “Rei,” she said. She looked around the lab, “I didn’t…mess anything up, did I?” she said, looking at the monitors.

Aedan waved his hand. “No, it’s fine. Just clearing up for the next group coming in. Most of my work is just… a lot of sequencing grunt work and running simulations.”

“So you’re a scientist?” said Rei, 

“More like an intern,” said Aedan. 

“But you’re… what, seventeen?” said Rei. 

“Yes, something along those lines,” said Aedan.

“’Something along those lines?’” repeated Rei.

Aedan shrugged and smiled.

“You’re weird,” said Rei, grinning.

“Most people don’t come to Oasis unless they like weird, just a little,” returned Aedan. He turned his attention back to the various trays on the laboratory counter. “You’re here for the conference, I take it?” he asked, organizing various trays and glassware. 

“You could say Efi’s a family friend,” said Rei.

“Friends in high places,” said Aedan, arranging several beakers just so, “You could do very well here.”

“Pfft. I doubt that,” said Rei.

“What? That little scuff with the security guards?” said Aedan, “Something tells me you’ve handled much worse trouble than that.”

“Something along those lines,” said Rei, folding her arms.

“Oh, so now  _you_  get to be weird and cryptic,” said Aedan with a grin before setting down one last tray of test tubes, “Well, my point is, maybe you could do with someone showing you the city.”

“And you’re the person to do that?” Rei arched an eyebrow.

“Something tells me you could use someone who can talk you out of trouble with security,” said Aedan, “And I happen to be just that sort of person.” His stomach growled, “…also I’ve been sequencing anemic capuchin monkey DNA for three hours straight and I could really,  _really_  go for some kibbeh,”

“Kibbeh?” said Rei.

“It’s like… this meat…” he made a lemon shape with his hands, “Thing? There’s a stand for it nearby. Are you hungry?”

“Sure,” said Rei with a shrug.

“Come on,” he said, shrugging off his labcoat and hanging it up to reveal a fitted white shirt with black stars around the neckline and faded black skinny jeans, “I’m  _starving.”_ He headed to the exit of the lab.

“Right behind you,” said Rei, moving to walk after him. She paused in front of one of the many monitors of the lab, displaying those selfsame cells endlessly doubling themselves through mitosis. She felt a nagging at the back of her head, that Ziegler-Shimada streak in her that said everything was always dangerous and nothing was ever simple, that nothing came easy and there was always something to fight. She shook her head. It couldn’t always be like that, could it? And even if it  _was_  always like that, it wasn’t like it was anything she couldn’t handle. She broke her eyes away from the screen and followed after Aedan.


	25. When Everything went to Shit Immediately After Rei Met Aedan

The two of them bought their kibbeh from a street vendor and returned to the gardens, talking and eating and looking around the Abu Hassoun gardens.

“Beautiful, aren’t they?” said Aedan as Rei leaned close to a sprig of orchids hanging off a garden wall, varying not only in color but in shape, and on the same plant. “Grown, not grafted, by the way,” Aedan added, “The tough part is editing the mycorrhizae.”

“Myco-what?” said Rei,

“Mycorrhizae. See– on their own, orchid seeds aren’t strong enough to actually sustain themselves for germination. You actually need a fungus, known as a mycorrhiza, to provide carbon for it to grow. You need to make the mycorrhiza adaptive, but not invasive–they’re made for each other, in that sense.”

“So it’s symbiotic. You have to edit two species for it to grow,” said Rei, looking up from the orchid. 

Aedan smiled, “Precisely,” he said.  

“A botanist and a geneticist,” said Rei, with a grin.

“An intern,” said Aedan with a slight eye roll, “And–” he gestured at the orchid, “That one isn’t mine. I did try to make my own, but mine ended up a bit more finicky and…” he rubbed the back of his neck, “…miserably ugly and carnivorous.”

“ _Carnivorous?_ ” Rei snickered.

“I realized my soil was too acidic and may have gotten a bit over-ambitious and thrown some Dionaea DNA,” said Aedan, “It was back to pipetting grunt work after that.”

Tired of being on their feet, the two of them opted to sit on a bench on a high walkway stretching over the gardens, eating their kibbeh.

“So, an intern, huh?” said Rei, wiping a bit of bulgur from the corner of her mouth.

“Of a sort,” said Aedan, “It’s like… independent studies, really. I don’t think I’ve ever been in a proper classroom my whole life.”

“You’re not missing too much,” said Rei, “Half of my classes are online anyway, and when I’m done with them…” she trailed off.

“…University?” offered Aedan.

“I’m looking at a few,” said Rei. There was a quiet beat as she took another bite of her kibbeh.

“You haven’t been talking a lot,” said Aedan, “I feel I’ve been talking your ear off.”

“Well, to be fair, your accent is very cute,” said Rei, “And it turns out if I look at science-y things long enough, I get to hear more of it.”

“That’s–” Aedan nearly inhaled a bit of bulgur and coughed and cleared his throat, “I’m–thank-thank you.” he sighed, “It’s just… there’s… a lot going on up here,” Aedan gestured next to his head, “I don’t mean that in a ‘ooh look at me, I’m so clever’ it’s… mostly a lot of overlapping nattering things… like… what I’m doing right now..”

“It’s fine, really,” Rei touched his arm before biting into her kibbeh.

“But… there… there aren’t a lot of people my age where I study. I don’t mean to dump everything on you all at once,” said Aedan.

“Aedan, I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to be,” said Rei, “I never get to just… do stuff like this.”

“…I don’t follow,” said Aedan.

“Just… meet someone and run around with them,” said Rei, “The people I grew up with they’re… they’re good they’re just… protective.” Rei itched at the brim of her hat, “ _Really_  protective,” she muttered.

“Mum can get the same way,” said Aedan, taking a bite as well.

“And now, I’m seventeen–and it’s like… I can’t wait to just… get out–but I also have no idea what I’m going to do with myself,” said Rei.

He gave a glance at the Oasis university towering in the distance. “You ever have an interest in the sciences?”

Rei shrugged. “A little bit, I guess. I don’t know…” she took another bite of kibbeh and thought as she chewed, then swallowed, “My parents, they’re always talking about how their families and the Omnic Crisis put them on a path that they were never sure they wanted. They always tell me they want me to be able to choose but it’s like… I know what they  _don’t_  want for me, but as far as what  _I_  want…” she trailed off and stuffed the last of her kibbeh in her mouth. “Arm I merkig since?” she said with her mouth full.

“Yeah, it makes sense,” Aedan was already crumpling up the empty paper that once held his kibbeh,  “What do they do for a living?”

“Mom’s a doctor, Dad’s in security,” said Rei, tossing her paper into a nearby trashcan, “We travel a lot.”

“I know how that is,” said Aedan, tossing his balled-up paper as well, but missing bouncing off the side  At that point one of the numerous hovering research and maintenance drones that floated through the area around Oasis’ university that was moseying by stopped, turned, and extended a robotic claw to pick up and drop the fallen piece of paper in the trash. “Fussy little things,” said Aedan as the drone continued on its way.

“I think they’re cute,” said Rei, smiling.

“Probably on its way to the Ministry of Geology…” said Aedan, “Those ones are always more sluggish…”

“Is someone controlling them or are they on a set path?”

“Usually one or several are assigned to a scientist or their assistants who can input various commands, send them on errands, what have you….” Aedan paused, then his eyes lit up and he suddenly got to his feet, “…do you want to see something fun?” he said, looking over his shoulder at her.

Rei grinned.

—

“I mean…  _officially_  the Ministry of Tourism states they aren’t safe for humans, but I would add the correction that they aren’t safe for  _stupid_ humans,” said Aedan as Rei looked at the glowing green pad in front of them, “They were designed to get drones around the city faster, get them up to higher walkways and to transport mag-streams quickly and easily. But they never could design a propulsion effect this powerful that would only work on the drones, so as a result—”

“It’s a jump pad,” said Rei.

“I–” Aedan itched at his temple, “Well, yes, basically. University students use it all the time if they’re late to labs, and I’ve used it plenty of times, and it hasn’t hurt me, even if you stay in the stream–the propulsion’s enough to counteract any impact effects.” He took a step toward the pad, “I mean… you don’t have to if you don’t want to—”

“Pfft. You think I’m  _scared?_ ” said Rei, putting her hands on her hips.

“Good to hear,” said Aedan as Rei stepped alongside him. “All right, three, two…” 

They both leapt onto the jump pad. Rei’s feet didn’t even touch the ground when they were suddenly hurtling straight up. She whooped and laughed as the ground suddenly shot down and she felt a warm desert wind in her face as they reached the apex of their skyward shot. She felt the adrenaline spike through her system as they started falling down, then gave a glance to Aedan. She was falling. Her body knew falling, but this time the Valkyrie wings weren’t there to catch her. Her hat flew off and upward with their tumble, and her hair was whipping around wildly as they fell down.

“Aedan–!?” she started, having to shout over the rush of air. Aedan just grabbed her hand. 

“It’s okay!” he shouted back at her, “Trust me!”

Rei squeezed his hand as the ground rushed up to meet them, but rather than feeling every bone in her shatter on impact there was simply a  _shoomp_  sound and they were shooting skyward once again. A sputter of giggles escaped Rei and she let go of his hand and he snatched her hat from the air, which was drifting down from where it blew off her head. “Hey! Watch this!” she shouted at their zenith. She did several flips and twists in their descent before righting herself just before they hit the propulsors and shot up again. She backflipped this time, twisting and jackknifing before righting herself once again.

“ _Iontach!_ ” he shouted above the roar of the air, half-drowned out by the  _shoomp_  of the jump pad.

“Eenta?” Rei shouted back at him.

He made a hand waving gesture as they descended again. Within the next few leaps, Aedan was flipping and twisting as well and eventually Rei lost count of how many ascents and descents they made, the world turning to a dizzing vertical blur around her. Adrenaline had a way of making you lose track of time.

“Hey!” a shout came from below and both of them, at the peak of their height looked down to see an impatient student with a research drone under her arm.

“Dismount at the next jump?” said Aedan.

Rei nodded. There was one last  _shoomp_  as they hit the jump pad and Rei pushed herself forward at an angle. Aedan managed to land on his feet on the upper walkway, dusting himself off.

“Well, that was a good start to the afternoon, where to nex–”

Rei crashed into him from above, knocking him to the ground with a grunt.

“Sorry! Sorry!” Rei said, stumbling off of him. 

“It’s fine–” he grunted, holding her hat out to her. Both of their hair were wild voluminous messes from the rush of wind, and they snickered at each other’s appearance.

“That was fun,” said Rei, doing her best to put her hat back on.

“You take to the air very well. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone use the jump pad like that,” said Aedan, “Like you were born to fly.”

“Oh–I just…” Rei reddened, “I… I’ve never–” she cleared her throat, “Uh, thanks.”

“You know–The Ministry of Transport has plenty of experimental individual flight programs here, you could–” He caught himself, “I mean– that is, if you have time during the conference…” he trailed off, “Will you be leaving right after?”

Rei tucked some of her hair back and pocketed her hands in her dress, “Well… Mom and dad’s work is pretty… demanding.”

“Same with my Mum,” said Aedan, stepping toward the edge of the walkway and folding his arms. He seemed thoughtful. “But you should have the opportunity, at least.”

“Opportunity?”

“I know someone in the Ministry of Transportation. Nahia Ghali. She could always use an intern. I mean… you know for when you complete your secondary schooling and you have any interest in… in uh…” he gestured out at Oasis, at the hanging gardens, the grand towering university, “…here. Just an introduction, business cards, that sort of thing.”

“You… want me to stay here?” said Rei.

Aedan rubbed the back of his neck, “I mean–if you want–you should have the option. You should have people you know here.”

Rei put her hands on her hips and gave him a skeptical half smile. 

“…and you found my rabbit,” said Aedan with a shrug, “If I lose him again and you’re not here, well–what then, you know?”

Rei snickered.

“I’ll introduce you to Nahia,” said Aedan, already walking, “Nothing binding. Just a contact.”

“Well, lead the way Mr. Connections,” said Rei, walking after him.

—

They took a hover tram back to the university together, each sharing a bud of Aedan’s earphones on the way over to listen to music. His music was  _ancient_ , not even Reinhardt listened to stuff that old, but somehow the wailing saxophone and the warbles of  _“Whooooo can I be noooooow you found me?”_   seemed to fit the lighting of the sun glinting on the university. It was comforting, in its strangeness. She leaned her head on his shoulder as they listened before the tram came to a stop. They entered the main building, and walked into an elevator.

“Which floor?” said Rei.

“Here, let me–” Aedan brought his wrist under a scanner just below the button panel, revealing a stylized blacklight QR code tattoo no bigger than a thumbnail on the underside of his wrist. The elevator dinged and started moving up.

“…convenient,” said Rei, “Will I have to get one when I come to Oasis?”

“You–? No, a keycard should suffice, for me, it’s just faster when you’re–” he caught himself.

“You’re…?” Rei looked at him expectantly.

“…A VIP,” he said, pocketing his hands.

“Oh, so you’re a VIP!” said Rei, snickering and folding her arms.

“Of a sort,” said Aedan.

“You say ‘Of a sort’ when you don’t like to go into details,” said Rei.

“Well… when saying such details run the risk of me sounding like much more of a pretentious arse then I already am…” Aedan said with a slight smile.

“An Intern VIP,” said Rei.

The elevator dinged and opened to a massive hallway, virtually glowing with high white geometrically patterned columns.

Rei peeked around a column to see a hall full of figures in strange and avant-garde clothing, though there was more than a handful of people wearing suits and more plain yet fashionable clothing–foreign businessmen and women, Rei assumed. She gave a glance down to her own sundress. “…I think I’m underdressed for this, she said, taking her hat off and running a hand through her hair nervously.

“We won’t be here long,” said Aedan, “Just sneaking past to Nahia’s office,” he took her hand and they walked briskly around the outer perimeters of the room.

“Okay so… how VIP are we talking here?” said Rei.

Aedan bit the inside of his lip and sighed. “My Mum’s a Minister.”

“She’s  _what?_ ”

“I don’t like to make a big deal of it and—Oh—there she is now,” he glanced off and Rei followed his line of sight to a woman with some kind of metallic headress and white, gold and lavender robes, talking to some foreign dignitaries. Aedan waved, and she apparently caught him in the corner of her eye and turned toward them.

Rei’s stomach dropped.

“Minister of Genetics,” Aedan started to explain, “She’s–” he glanced off to his side and saw that Rei was gone. He could only hear the distant desperate slaps of her sandals on the tile floor.

“Rei?” he took off in a run off in the direction of the sound, racing through the columned hall, narrowly shoving past a moseying research drone and several foreign dignitaries to reach the elevator just in time to see Rei desperately hitting a button on the inside panel. The doors of the elevator were closing. He raced forward and was barely able to slip between them as they closed, panting, with Rei standing across from him, eyes wild as the elevator descended

“You’re…” He huffed and buckled over, trying to catch his breath, “You’re really fast. What–what  _was_  that back there?!”

“That’s Moira O’Deorain,” said Rei, her voice hollow.

“Well… yes,” said Aedan.

“God–and you have the  _hair_ –and the accent–and your face is—I’m so  _stupid!_ ” Rei pressed her knuckles to her forehead.

“Hey–you’re not stupid,” said Aedan, trying to speak as calmingly as possible.

“She’s your  _mom_ —” Rei was pacing back and forth, her fingertips pressed to her forehead.

“…as I’ve said,” said Aedan.

 “That–that doesn’t make sense! She’s like, a million!” said Rei.

“Okay, rude,” said Aedan.

“And she’s  _crazy!_ ” Rei ranted on, “She doesn’t care about people–she doesn’t care about children! She’s a Talon psycho!”

Aedan blanched and his mouth tightened. The elevator suddenly jerked a bit.

_“We are experiencing some technical difficulties,”_  a pleasant female voice spoke over the elevator speakers,  _“Please stand by.”_

 “There’s a lot about her work that you don’t understand,” said Aedan.

“What? That she’s backed by a terrorist organization? That she makes bioweapons?” said Rei.

Aedan’s hand curled into a white-knuckled fist at his side. “My mother told me that if you have the resources, if you have the technology, it only makes sense to test the limits of their capabilities,” said Aedan.

“Says the woman who took Angela Ziegler’s work and turned it into something that goes against everything she stands for,” said Rei.

Aedan scoffed, “My mother only took that work to its natural conclusion.”

“ _She made it suck the life out of people!_ ” Rei snapped, “She’s a monster!” 

Aedan’s mouth drew to a thin line. “She took steps forward that Ziegler was too afraid to take. Why are you so offended on her behalf, anyway? it’s not like  _you_ –” He stopped and something crossed over his face as he recognized something in hers. Rei suddenly remembered something her father had told her a while back.  _You have the Shimada look, obviously,_  he said, B _ut when you’re angry? When you’re angry, you look just like your mother._

The elevator suddenly dinged and shuddered to life again. “ _Technical issues resolved. Resuming Service. Thank you for your patience,_ ” the cheerful female voice over the elevator spoke. 

“’Mom’s a doctor and Dad’s in security,’” Aedan repeated the words she had spoken back to her, “We travel a lot.” He imitated the joking chopping gesture she had made back when they first met in his lab, “’Born to fly,’ ’Ninja,’“ he said quietly.

Rei’s breath caught in her throat.

“It’s you,” Aedan said quietly. Rei flinched at those two simple words and Aedan’s eyes widened.  “Talon’s been looking for you for so long…” he said, “And you just… walked right up to me… and I didn’t even…”

The elevator dinged and the doors opened and Rei sprinted out. Aedan ran after her, but quickly lost her in the crowds of the conference. She ran as fast and as hard as she could, racing breaking line of sight by dipping around corners, desperately digging her comm out of the pockets of her dress and calling her mother.

“Rei?” The comm didn’t even make it through the first ring when Mercy picked up, “Is everything–?”

“We need to leave,” said Rei.

“What happ–” Mercy started.

“Please,” Rei said.

“Activating your comm’s beacon. We’ll be right there. Stay safe,  _sunneschii_.” 

Rei kept walking, following the flow of the crowd to keep hidden. “Stupid,” she muttered under her breath to herself, “ _Stupid.”_


	26. Seye and Faustine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Son of Doomfist, Meet Adoptive Daughter of Maximilien

The door to the jet opened onto a drizzly tarmac. Thailand was in its cool season but was still a few degrees warmer compared to the heavily air-conditioned interior of the Jet. Seye shouldered his bag and went down the stairs, feeling the drizzle weigh down on the collar of his shirt. He straightened his collar. The instructions had been to dress like a tourist, and he wore a plain white t-shirt with a denim vest with adire paneling at the shoulders, which… he wasn’t sure if you could call such an outfit tourist-y but he figured ‘casual’ should suffice, though already the mugginess had both vest and shirt sticking to his skin. He glanced across the tarmac to see a figure under a translucent red umbrella. She was a pale girl with champagne blonde hair cut in a french bob, donning a matching translucent red raincoat over a high-necked red floral dress. She was young. 2 years, maybe three within his own age, but he noted the lines and red indents in her face. Ogundimu Nerve prosthetics. His father had similar ones in his own face, but not this delicate. Two tiny red elongated hexagons at the outside corners of her cheekbones and eyebrows, the ones at her eyebrows barely hidden by her bangs, but connected by a 140-degree angle line on each side.

“Monsieur Ogundimu,” she said, stepping toward him.

“And you must be the famous Miss Thibault,” said Seye.

“Not famous, I hope,” she said with a slight smile.

“Noteworthy?” he suggested.

“I can live with noteworthy. Faustine,” she extended a gloved hand toward him and he shook it. She had to bring her arm up slightly to bring them both under her umbrella.

“Seye. Is Thailand to your liking, Faustine?” asked Seye as they walked across the tarmac.

She slapped a mosquito that had landed on the side of her neck, and then examined the little red smudge it left behind on her gray glove with distaste. “It’s tolerable,” she said, “It’s not Monaco.”

Seye smirked a little, “You’ve probably gotten this often but–”

“‘But you don’t  _look_  like your father,’” Faustine cut him off and gave him a sidelong glance, “Yes. I get it often,” she said with a smile as they continued walking, “You’ve been briefed on the mission, I take it?” she said, her voice low and yet casual as they walked to a sleek black hovercar.

“I’ve been under the impression that Talon is more interested in the future than the past,” said Seye as Faustine folded up her umbrella and got in the car. He got in after her.

“Someone’s been listening to a few too many of his father’s axioms,” said Faustine, scrolling through her phone, “Here,” she hit a panel in the car seat in front of him, “As per your specifications,” she said as the panel opened. revealing two metal isosceles trapezoids. Seye picked one up and placed it on the back of his hand. He inhaled sharply as the nerves uplinked and metal sheathed itself over his fingers, extending off of the plate and up his arm, stopping at the deltoid. He turned his palm over to see the metallic plates spiral around the center of his palm like a nautilus shell. He clenched his fingers into a fist and opened it again, revealing the tiny graviton repulsor now thrumming in the center of his palm.

“The target,” said Faustine, unfolding her tablet and showing a picture of a bespectacled omnic monk, “Acharya-9. Shambali theologian, AI-Anthropologist, and archeologist.”

“…why would a robot need glasses?” said Seye, squinting.

Faustine gave him another sidelong glance.

“I think it’s a valid question,” said Seye.

Faustine gave a slight eye roll before continuing, “In six weeks there will be a memorial to Tekharta Mondatta. The twentieth anniversary of his death. Acharya here has been gifted with logistical intel to the event. This memorial is supposed to be a statement. The world is saying that it is not afraid of Talon. That it does not believe in what we are capable of.”

“So, obviously, we should correct them on that misconception,” said Seye with a slight smile.

“Obviously,” Faustine said with a nod, “Acharya has been on the Shambali panel deciding the speakers for this memorial, and as such, he knows who is going to be at it, and may also possess some intel as to the security of the event as well.”

“And…we’re going to interrogate him?” said Seye.

“In a sense, yes,” said Faustine, “Full disclosure–”

“The catch,” said Seye.

Faustine smiled a little, “You could call it that,” she tapped at her tablet a bit, “This is also… a test.”

“A test?” said Seye.

“Superiors want to see how well you function in a covert operation,” said Faustine.

“I can be subtle,” Seye said on reflex.

Faustine gave him a slightly wearied look.

“…How much of my training footage have you seen?” Seye asked, his voice pitching up more than he would like.

“All of it,” said Faustine, “All of your training footage. You know, you’re only here because my father insisted I have backup. I just need you to watch my back until we make it to the Evac.” 

Seye’s lips thinned and he scoffed a bit. “Okay then,” he said, taking the other steel trapezoid and pressing it to the back of his palm, inhaling sharply again as the other gauntlet formed.

Faustine crossed her legs. As she adjusted herself in her seat he noticed similar hexagonal nodes to the ones on her cheekbones and temples, but larger and on the sides of her knees, with similar lines up the side and center of her legs.  Her eyes flicked up from her tablet to him and he glanced off quickly before his observation could be taken the wrong way.

“Noticing the product of your family business?” she asked.

“Are you satisfied with the product?” he asked.

She smiled, set her tablet in her lap, and pulled off one of her gloves, revealing an intricate pattern of lines on the back of her hand, with several red hexagons around her wrist, and hexagons on all of the knuckles of her fingers. She turned her hand over to reveal an equally intricate pattern of lines and red nodes on her palm before pulling her glove back on again. “Very,” she said, with a smile, “Though… my neuroprostheses aren’t exactly part of the regular line.”

The car dropped them off a ways from the ruins. Security was lowered. Not a high tourist season. Several security drones rolled through. Helix. Not the latest models. It was coming together why Talon would pick a target as remote as this one—the highest amount of knowledge about the impending memorial service, in the station least likely to draw attention. Cutthroat world, archeology.

“So–the plan?” said Faustine as they walked past several frescoes of dragons and theppanom.

“I get you to the archeologist,” said Seye.

Faustine gave him a little smile over her shoulder.

“…Covertly,” Seye added, “Because I can do covert.”

“…you’re wearing those gauntlets and you didn’t even bother with a long-sleeved shirt,” said Faustine flatly.

“Who’s to say they aren’t state-of-the-art prosthetics?” said Seye, putting his hands on his hips.

Faustine just rolled her eyes. Most of the tourists were clearing out for the day, being gently prodded on by the Helix Security drones so that the academics could get in a few precious hours of surveying before the park service shut them down for the night. Faustine pulled out her tablet again briefly and tapped in a few notes before they headed into the ruins. The two of them stood side by side, closely examining a sculpture of an elephant as the rest of the tourists were slowly herded out. Seye and Faustine, meanwhile, moved further to the center of the ruins, where their target was at the interior of a crumbling temple. It was quiet, slightly amusing not-quite dance of moving from sculpture to sculpture to half-ruined building to avoid the security drones. The ruins themselves caught the afterglow of the setting sun, and the cloudy, warm sky took on orange and lavender hues, the clouds and heat managing to make it unclear exactly what point on the horizon the sun was setting. Nearly an hour passed before they were the last ones wandering about the ruins, their only other company being the helix security drones. Seye and Faustine exchanged glances as the Helix drone neared them.

“I can handle this,” said Faustine, calmly.

“Sir and Miss,” the drone said, “Ayutthaya Ruins park is about to be closed to unauthorized personnel. Please proceed to the nearest park ex–”

In a smooth movement Faustine had pulled her glove off of her hand and clawed her fingers against the optic panel of the security drone. Its voice warbled and distorted and she took in a shuddering breath and Seye watched with something he wasn’t quite sure was awe or horror as the skin on the back of her hand shifted, as if wires were moving underneath it, and suddenly red and black tendrils burst from the sides of the panels of the helix drone’s head. The drone seemed to vibrate under her touch, the wires or tendrils causing it to spark and spasm, until Faustine withdrew her hand, her black and red tendrils shooting back underneath her fingernails. The drone was still twitching next to her, its optical light bright red rather than blue as she made sure her manicure was intact.

“There,” she said, curling her fingers in with some satisfaction, “With that one taken over, the collective security network for this site should be–”

The security drone started blaring an alarm as the heads of all the other security drones swiveled towards them.

“…Have I mentioned I hate these older models?” said Faustine. Seye quickly wrapped one arm around her waist and used the gauntlet of his free arm to fire off a repulsor and send them both flying out of the range of the first stun blasts of the security drone. Bright blue blasts of stun-pulse rounds whizzed overhead as they scrambled to cover behind a statue of an elephant.

“’Be  _subtle_ , Seye!’” said Seye in a mock French accent, blasting a security drone back with his gauntlets, “’Zees eez  _cov-airt,_  Seye!’” 

“You don’t need to rub my nose in it!” snapped Faustine, already breaking off into a run toward the inner sanctum of the ruins.

“Hey!” Seye took off after her, using his gauntlets to blast back several Helix drones as firing at her as she did so. If he was being completely honest with himself, Faustine was more of the wildcard in this situation than the drones. The drones themselves provided little more of a challenge than the lowest level settings on Talon training bots, but it was the number of them that concerned him, and the likelihood that they were bringing more authorities to the area. They had their evac. He just had to keep her in his line of sight and—

He was sideswiped by a drone and sent painfully bouncing across stone, then rolling across grass. Faustine, he assumed, didn’t stop running towards the center. The mission took priority for her. He was just her backup. Fine. He could deal with backup. He hauled himself to his feet and brought up his gauntlets, then gave a glance to his surroundings. All things considered Talon probably wouldn’t want him obliterating a world heritage site fighting some security drones. Keeping it clean.  _Subtle,_  he thought, propelling himself forward with a blast of repulsors then smashing a steel-clad fist into the side of one of the drones,  _I can do subtle._  The drone was downed, it stun gun firing off sporadically, which Seye quickly ripped off of the frame and pointed at another drone, successfully downing it in a shower of sparks before he was sent running by another flurry of blue sparks overhead. He hauled up the torso chassis of the downed drone closest to him and used that to block the next flurry of blasts that came from a droid across the ruins. Gritting his teeth, he pressed his palm to the back of his makeshift shield and blasted through it. Through the smoldering hole in the chassis, he saw the now smoking and sparking remains of the other drone. This was fine. It was all fine. He could keep them occupied out here and Faustine could interrogate their target on the interior and–okay the drones were heading toward the sanctum now. That wasn’t good.

“Oh for—” he muttered under his breath, firing off another charge from his gauntlet and obliterating another drone as he hurried down a narrow stone hall after the drone, firing off more blasts from his gauntlets to push the pursuing drones behind him back. He skidded to a hault at the inner sanctum to see Faustine bent over a collapsed Omnic. Their target.

Acharya was sprawled on the ground under Faustine’s hand, convulsing slightly as red and black wires and tendrils threaded themselves among his piston collarbones and jugulars, managing to poke their way out of that tight omnic jaw.

“This is interrogation?” said Seye, turning on his heel and blasting several more charges down the hall.

“It  _would be_  if you let me concentrate,” said Faustine, squeezing her eyes shut as the Omnic’s convulsions went more violent beneath her touch.

“Because that worked  _so well_  with the first drone!” Seye snapped back.

“I know what I’m doing!” said Faustine before sparks flew off the omnic and Faustine’s head jutted back in a shuddering breath.

“Faus–?” Seye started but with a flick of her wrist, Faustine extracted her wires from the Omnic, now prone on the stone floor.

“I have what we need,” said Faustine, getting to her feet, one last wire sliding back beneath the nail of her pinky finger, “Let’s get out of here.”

“You didn’t exactly make that an easy option!” snapped Seye, blasting down the stone hallway of the sanctum at the drones.

Faustine calmly tapped at her phone. “Evac’s coming to our location,” she said, “We just need to think of another way out of here.”

“ _This_  is our only way out of here!” said Seye, blasting down the hall, “If you’ve got a better idea, I’d love to hear it!”

“…Make another way out?” said Faustine, gesturing at a wall.

Seye blasted the head off of another drone, and took the single beat between gauntlet blasts to give her an  _‘Are you serious?’_  look. “World Heritage Site,” he said.

“ _Talon,_ ” said Faustine.

“ _You_  said subtle, “ said Seye.

Faustine opened her mouth for rebuttal, then closed it and flinched back as more blue sparks flew down the hallway. They both ducked off to the sides of the hallway as more stun shots flew their way.

“Okay,” said Seye after another flurry of blue shots, “Idea.” He ducked and rolled across the hallway to Faustine’s side of the chamber, then turned around and gestured at his back with his thumb. 

“…You can’t be serious.” said Faustine.

“Trust me,” said Seye, “Evac’s locked on to our location, right?”

Faustine’s brow furrowed and she pursed her lips.

“Subtle,” said Seye.

“…subtle,” conceded Faustine.

It was not subtle. Faustine, riding piggy-back and on Seye, blasting himself forward with both gauntlets and destroying drones in his wake while Faustine was screaming and cursing in French was probably the opposite of subtle, but it got them out of there. The talon evac vehicle swept in and picked them up and it was a mad scramble into the little hovership, but Ayutthaya was shrinking away beneath them as they both sat, processing the mission, in their seats.

“You kids get the intel?” the pilot spoke from the front.

“I–yes,” said Faustine, pulling out her tablet and having several wire tendrils extend from beneath her fingernails to its port, “Yes we got the intel.”

“ _Covertly,_ ” Seye added. 

Faustine opened her mouth to correct him, but Seye gave her an insufferably smug,  _‘Who wants to tell them who set off the first drone?’_  look and she closed her mouth. “…Covertly,” she said, her voice dripping with venom.

“Hey! Knew you had it in ya!” said the pilot, “So… care to share what you found out?”

Seye leaned over Faustine’s shoulder to look at the screen of her tablet, which featured a list of names of ‘Confirmed Speakers’ for Mondatta’s 20th anniversary memorial. 

“…I think we might need to take a new approach to our plans for the memorial,” said Faustine.

Seye’s eyebrows raised, then he followed her eyes and his eyes widened at the name ‘Tekharta Zenyatta’ at the bottom of the list.

“Twenty years since Mondatta died and his brother finally has something to say,” said Seye quietly, “…took him long enough.”


	27. Rei and the Necklace

“Reeiiii!”  Genji’s call sounded across the apartment as he shouldered a duffle bag, “The Orca’s warming up! Come on! We’re going to be late!”

“Give me a second!” Rei called back from her room.

“Teenagers,” muttered Genji.

Mercy elbowed him softly. “ _Our_  teenager,” she said with a smile.

Genji huffed a little. “How do you manage to make me feel ancient with just two words?” he asked, drumming his fingers along the strap of his duffle bag, “Rei!” he called again.

“Just a minute!” Rei called back.

In a room where the walls were all but completely covered in  _Midori Rider_  and  _Lone Wolf and Cub_  posters, Rei was tapping away at a keyboard, eyes scanning down the holoscreen of her monitor. “Come on…” she said, opening an email from her Virtu-School, “Come on…”

“This means a lot to Zenyatta,” muttered Genji, “What could possibly be more important than—?”

A whoop came from Rei’s room and Rei scrambled out, her backpack on one shoulder. “A!” She shouted, “Last class! I got an A! I graduated!”

“What?” Genji dropped the duffle bag. 

Rei brought up the holoscreen on her comm. “Final grades finally came in,” she said, a little bit smugly. She looked over at Mercy. “I know it’s not exactly medical school but–”

Mercy’s hands were cupped over her mouth and her eyes were glittering with tears as Genji took Rei up in a tight hug.

“Mom?” Rei said, and then was rocked back on her heels from a hug from her mother as well. Rei was barely able to put one arm around Mercy before Mercy broke away with her hands on Rei’s shoulders. “My  _sunneschii_ …” she said, a tear budding out at the corner of her eyes.

“Mom–” Rei started.

“Stay right there,” said Mercy, suddenly rushing past Rei down the hall of the apartment.

“Angela we still need to go!” Genji called after her.

“I know! It’ll just be a minute!” Angela shouted back from their bedroom. There was the sound of desperate rifling through drawers, and quiet muttering in German.

“Here!” said Mercy, finally emerging from the room after two minutes and walking down the hall, gingerly holding something in both hands. Rei squinted a little and saw a thin gold chain draped over her fingers. Rei held her hands out and Mercy placed a small pendant on a gold chain in her palm. The pendant itself was gold, oval-shaped, and only a little larger than her thumbnail, and it featured a very worn down winged circle on it. Or at least it looked like a winged circle. It reminded Rei a bit of the logo on her mother’s valkyrie suit. “That,” said Mercy, “Is our coat of arms. What’s left of it at least. It’s been passed down countless generations of Pfenningers–My mother’s side of the family. Well… countless because a lot of us—” Mercy cut herself off and shook her head, “Anyway, originally, the tradition was that you would have it when I was gone but… I figure it’s time for a new tradition, don’t you?”

“Mom…” Rei said quietly.

“My parents never got to see me graduating… anything,” said Mercy, “Now I know it’s terribly old fashioned, and you don’t have to wear it if you don’t like it, and you don’t need to have your own children to pass it on to, but if you could just hang on to it—”

“I’ll wear it,” said Rei, “It’s beautiful, Mom. Thank you.”

Mercy blinked a few times, and bit the inside of her lip and smiled before hugging Rei tightly again and kissing her forehead. Genji gave Rei a slight tousle of her hair before picking his duffle bag back up. He glanced at the clock across the room as Mercy fastened the pendant around Rei’s neck.

“As… wonderful as all this is…” he said quietly, “We still have an Orca to catch.”

“I know,” said Rei, “I’m ready.”

—

It was a short Orca ride to London from Gibraltar. Rei’s eyes kept trailing over to Zenyatta, who seemed unable to decide between going over loose leaf notes and meditating. Mercy was busying herself with her tablet, and Rei found herself mindlessly rubbing her thumb over the pendant she had been given. 

“Is he okay?” Rei said in a hushed tone to Genji.

“He’s just nervous,” said Genji.

Rei processed this for a few seconds. “Wait—Master Zenyatta gets  _nervous?_ ”

“This is very important to him,” said Genji, quietly.

Rei brought her legs up in her seat and hugged her knees a little. “I didn’t know Mondatta,” she said quietly.

“That’s all right,” said Genji.

“Did you know him?” asked Rei, looking over to her father.

Genji thought for a little bit, “I think we met very briefly, but not enough to really get to know him. He and Master had… different beliefs.”

“But they’re still family,” said Mercy.

“Still family,” Genji said quietly after her.

“Well it’s just a little speech,” said Rei, “It can’t be that scary, can it?”

“I am not a dogmatist,” Zenyatta spoke up at last, his orbs around him spinning and bouncing restlessly as he stared at the piece of paper in front of him, “I am not a lecturer. I’m barely even a  _monk._ ”

“You’ll do fine, Master. If you can get through through my stubbornness, this crowd should be no problem,” said Genji.

“Yeah!” said Rei, “And I’m sure it won’t even be that big of a…” she looked out the window of the orca as it descended on London and saw hundreds of glittering white and yello lights of candles and cellphones in the square where Mondatta’s massive statue stood, “…deal…” Rei finished her sentence as the Orca lowered down to a vacant lot.

“…How large is the crowd?” asked Zenyatta.

“Not big!” said Rei, “ _Definitely_  not like two thousand people.” 

Mercy sighed and touched her hand to her forehead as the paper in Zenyatta’s hands crinkled with anxiety. “…How many people?” Zenyatta asked.

“Don’t uh… don’t worry about it…You’ll do fine?” Rei’s voice came out a near squeak. 

“Maybe it’s not too late to go back,” said Zenyatta, “Maybe—”

The door of the Orca opened and Emily came bounding into the Orca and took up Zenyatta in a hug and then eagerly shook his hand.

“You’re here!” She said, “You’re here! Oh thank goodness, everyone’s waiting for you!”

“Me?” Zenyatta said sheepishly.

“Well yes, we’ve already had the Shambali Liaison to Numbani speak, the Human/Omnic Marriage Rights Front Representatives speak, we’ve had a handful of volunteers from the relief shelters rallying people up, and now that you’re here we can finally kick off the vigil!” Emily exhaled, “You have no  _idea_  how much this means to everyone.”

“…No idea at all…” Zenyatta repeated hollowly.

“Em?” Tracer leaned into the Orca, “We’re on the clock here, we need to get him to that stage.”

“I thought time didn’t tell Lena Oxton what to do?” said Emily, looking over her shoulder.

“Well no, not me,” said Tracer, “’Fraid I can’t say the same for everyone else though, love,” Tracer gave a small wave to Mercy and Genji as they were standing up out of their seats, “Doc–Genji, good to see you again—” she cut herself off as she looked at Rei, “Look at you! Cor blimey you just… sprung up all at once, didn’t you!?” 

“It’s only been a couple of months,” said Rei, a little sheepishly.

“You have no business being this tall,” said Tracer joke-scoldingly. Rei just fidgeted with her hair before Tracer hugged her. “Been too long, love.” She looked at the rest of the family, “Welp. People are waiting. Shall we?”

Mercy hooked her arm in Genji’s and they walked out of the Orca into the streets of London.

Zenyatta was nervously folding up his notes when Rei sidled up alongside him, “Come on,” she said, “It’s going to be fine.”

“You are not the one giving the speech,” said Zenyatta as Rei hooked her arm in his and he begrudgingly floated alongside her.

“But I believe in you!” said Rei as Emily handed her a lit candle for the vigil, “That counts for something, right?”

“Let’s hope so,” said Zenyatta.

Rei gave a glance down to the pendant around her neck, “I think it does,” she said, smiling.


	28. Breach Pt. 1

At 7:30 AM, the slats of the shades in Aedan’s room automatically tilted, flooding yellow-gray morning light into the room as a cheerful fairy-like guitar/synth chime greeted the day and served as an alarm. Aedan muttered something under his breath and pulled his pillow over his head as the synth and guitar increased in volume until his other hand flailed out, grabbed his phone off of his bedside table, and shut the alarm off. 

“ _Good morning Aedan O’Deorain,_ ” an automated AI voice came over the same speakers which chimed his alarm,  _“The time is 7:31. The outside temperature is a balmy 7.2 degrees celsius with some clouds and an 11% chance of precipitation. ”_

“Mm,” Aedan sloughed out from between mattress and comforter, “Mum?”

_“Moira O’Deorain had several items that required her attention and left the apartment at 0300 hours.”_

“0300–” Aedan raised an eyebrow but sighed and stretched, “Fine.” It wouldn’t be the first time Moira was struck with inspiration and left for the lab in the middle of the night.

_“She wished me to inform you that your armor fitting and biofeed calibration should proceed as scheduled, however,”_ the AI added.

“Got it, got it…” said Aedan, peeling off his holey Velvet Underground shirt and stumbling out of his sweats as he walked into the bathroom.

_“She is in the lab right now, do you wish me to relay a message?”_  the AI asked.

“’Good morning,’ I guess?” said Aedan, stepping into the shower, “Oh-and uh… Play Playlist 6.”

_“Playing Playlist 6,_ ” said the AI as Aedan turned on the shower and the bathroom filled with steam and Patti Smith’s “Gloria.” After the shower, Aedan toweled off and dressed, somewhat skeptically eying the bareness of his own room. Their facility quarters were much more minimalist than their elegant high-rise back in Oasis, but then again, that was the apartment of an Oasis minister, and this, well, this  _was_  Talon. Still, Aedan wondered how within protocol a few posters or maybe a decal might be.

_“Breakfast this morning is amaranth parfait with strawberries,”_  the AI spoke to Aedan as he walked to the kitchen and pulled the bowl out of the fridge,  _“311 Calories. 4.3 Grams of fat. Enriched with 14 grams of almond-soy protei–”  
_

“Got it. Can you put the news on for me?” said Aedan, grabbing a spoon and pushing the drawer shut with his hip and walked over to the apartment couch as their screen lit up with a thrum as Aedan plopped down on the couch and ate his breakfast as a newscaster appeared on the screen. He recognized the skyline behind her. London.

_“…where just hours ago a massive attack was carried out at the 20th Anniversary memorial of Tekharta Mondatta,”_  The newscaster said,  _“In this very spot, a massive subterranean EMP weapon was activated, temporarily shutting down every electrical device in a two-block radius, with extensive damage being dealt at the epicenter of the memorial. Authorities have confirmed this as a Talon attack.”_

“They never tell me anything around here,” muttered Aedan, taking another bite of his breakfast. 

_“I’ve just received the latest numbers from local hospitals and Omnic repair centers,”_ the newscaster went on,  _“While Overwatch still hasn’t released a statement, we have been told that Tekharta Zenyatta is still in critical condition following the attack. According to reports, there were no human deaths, but 8 omnics’ memory and personality banks damaged beyond any hope for rebooting, and 11 humans have been hospitalized for electrical injuries induced by their proximity to the most heavily affected omnics. Four are still in critical condition. One human is reported missing from the incident—”  
_

“Aedan,” Moira’s voice came over the apartment speaker system and the image on the TV froze, “You did get the message that your biofeed calibration was still scheduled, right?”

“Mum, I  _just_  sat down to eat,” said Aedan.

“You can eat and walk,” said Moira, “Lab now,  _le do thoil._ ”

“ _Tuigim_ ,” muttered Aedan, hauling himself up from the couch.

—

Aedan’s eyes lingered on the glowing glass tubes that lined the lab walls. The biotic plasma within these tubes lit up the room a sickly but almost homey yellow, like an aging photograph. Suspended in the yellow tubes, purple-black nanite amalgams warped and shifted, like smoke, like ink diluting in water, like embryos kicking. 

“So, 3 in the morning?” said Aedan, still watching the nanite amalgams.

“There was an item that required my attention,” said Moira, holding up a small metallic triangle up to the light of the lab worktable and squinting at it. 

“A… London item that required you attention?”

Moira smiled. “Perhaps…”

“What was the team grabbing in London?” said Aedan.

“Who said they were grabbing anything in London?” said Moira.

“If Talon wanted to make a statement they’d do something bigger than an EMP,” said Aedan folding his arms, “This looks like textbook asset acquisition.”

Moira huffed and rolled her eyes a little, smiling. “Do I have to explain what ‘compartmentalization’ means?”

“It means you don’t want to tell me?” said Aedan, folding his arms and raising his eyebrows.

“It means you knowing might be more trouble than you want,” said Moira, walking over with a small tray holding two metallic triangles, “And you  _do_  remember why I called you down here to begin with?” 

Aedan sighed, “Yes,” he said, leaning back in his seat.

“Hold still,” said Moira, picking up one of the triangles from her tray, “This may sting a little.” 

Cupping the back of Aedan’s head Moira pressed one biofeed sensor above the inner corner of Aedan’s eyebrow. It prickled on contact, like the rough end of velcro, then stuck. Moira placed the other one on as well, and that one prickled too.

“That wasn’t so bad,” said Aedan.

“I haven’t turned them on yet,” said Moira, walking over to a monitor, “Deep breath.” She hit a key on her keyboard and Aedan flinched at what felt like bee stings above his eyebrows, then ached for a few moments after. His eyes ached, like he had been staring at a screen for hours, but that faded too.

“You get used to them,” said Moira, “It’s better running around with a silly-looking halo biofeed, I assure you.” 

Aedan groaned a little, massaging his temples, and then opened his eyes.

“So do you see them?” asked Moira. Aedan turned his head, seeing the numerous frames of Talon guards and grunts moving through the halls of the compound highlighted through the walls in a noticeable but non-distracting green.

“Yes,” said Aedan.

“Good,” said Moira, she put her hands on his shoulders, “We’re scientists first and agents second, remember that. This,” she pressed a finger against his temple, “Is more important than any rabble of grunts and more powerful than any weapon. If you ever find yourself in the field, you would do well to remember that.” She brought herself up to her full height, “Speaking of the field,” she continued, walking over to her desk, “We’ve thought it prudent to make sure you have some equipment, should you ever be called upon, or if there is ever an attack on one of our facilities.” She motioned to him and he stood up and walked up alongside her as she opened a relatively large box on her lab table and pulled out what appeared to be a deep gray smock. “Everything’s been crafted to your proportions from all of our biodata,” she said, putting the smock into his arms, “But I figure we should make sure the whole thing fits.”

Aedan nodded, took the box, then walked of to the compound locker rooms to dress. The outfit itself was a sort of hybrid between Talon lab technician gear and the standard assassin’s armor. It was a bit tedious to get on, but fairly straightforward. Moira was waiting for him when he got back, straightening one of the gauntlets.

“It fits all right?” she asked.

“It’s… a little heavy on the chest,” said Aedan.

“Nothing a bit more strength training can’t fix,” said Moira, “Try fading.”

Aedan decomposed his entire physical form to black smoke, which whipped around Moira before he reformed, stumbling a bit behind her. She turned on her heel to face him, and he patted at the chest plate, making sure everything was still in place, and then gave Moira a thumbs up.

 “Very good,” said Moira, “Hopefully you’ll never be out in the field, but it doesn’t hurt to be prepared,” she paused, “You look handsome,  _a thaisce._ ” 

“Thank you,” said Aedan, looking down at the armor. He rolled his wrists, “Sure you don’t need me for a mission? I’m all geared up.”

Moira just chuckled. “I admire your eagerness,” she said, ruffling his hair. Aedan just grinned and looked around again, squinting at the green highlighted silhouettes through them.

“The data it sends you is limited, of course,” said Moira, “Distance, alarms of other team members in critical condition, and so on–it should serve you well.”

“You realize I’m only going to use this for evil, right?” said Aedan.

Moira just snorted.

“Lots of blackmail material,” said Aedan, squinting, at the walls. He watched the silhouette of a guard sprinting through the halls. “Like that trooper, for example–bet he’s late for something—”

Another green silhouette raced after the first.

“…That one too, I guess?” said Aedan.

The smile shrank on Moira’s face.

A third Talon sniper’s silhouette could be seen through the biofeed. “Her too? I guess they all must have—” the lights suddenly dimmed and an alarm started blaring as Moira drew herself up to her full height.

“Security breach?” said Aedan.

“…Can’t trust people to keep it together for 15 minutes without me….” muttered Moira, walking to the door, “Aedan, stay in the lab.”

“I can help–” Aedan started.

“ _Stay,_ ” said Moira, passing through the door. Aedan was left sitting in the lab, feeling kind of foolish that he had just been outfitted for a mission, but was being sidelined now that there was a potential breach at the facility. There was a minute or two of tense waiting, and Aedan walked to the door, but didn’t open it, instead looking through the biofeed as best he could. He saw one guard get thrown back by some unseen force, another guard buckled over as some impact struck his stomach before being floored by an…attack from above? The biofeed couldn’t give him intel on hostiles since they weren’t calibrated to it, but he would have guessed five or six intruders must have been blowing their way through the facility guards.

“Okay, no, not staying here,” he muttered under his breath, hitting the panel next to the door to see Moira, accompanied by several Talon troopers, running down the hall.

“Aedan!’ Moira’s next call to him was harsh, “I  _told_  you to stay in the lab!”

One of the troopers next to her brought their hand to the side of their helmet, “Target incoming.”

“Target—?” Aedan started and turned his head as a figure slid into view down the hall. Not five intruders. Just one. A girl, dark haired, gripping an IV stand with the bottom wheels snapped off and wielding it like a bo staff, panting, eyes wide. He knew her instantly.

“Aedan–get out of the way!” Moira snapped, but the girl was already racing toward him. She threw the IV like a javelin and it crashed into one of the Talon troopers at Moira’s side, knocking him to the floor. Aedan knew he should have faded–that would be the proper thing to do: Fade, let her run into his mother and their lineup of troopers just behind him, simple enough–but there was one fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a beat where he made eye contact with her. He remembered a girl in a yellow dress holding a rabbit back in Oasis. This was only the same girl in the most minimal sense, all of her features contorted by terror and fury and pure fight-or flight instinct. Still, he recognized large dark gray eyes and thick eyebrows, hair tied half-back by a green and yellow ribbon. 

_Rei,_  he thought,  _The asset was Rei._

Of course the second half of this thought was spent reeling from a sharp punch in the solarplexus followed up by a stunning uppercut to the jaw. And suddenly she seized him by the breastplate of his armor and all at once had him in a headlock, her forearm firm against his neck, her other hand bracing his head forward in the headlock. A meat shield. A hostage. 

“Everyone, stand back!” Rei shouted, “Don’t make me—I’ll—” she seemed to be having trouble finding the words to properly threaten everyone so she shoved Aedan’s neck harder against her forearm, “Don’t come any closer or I’ll snap his pencil neck! I’m serious! Stay back!”

Aedan made eye-contact with Moira, who seemed completely unfazed by this threat.

“No you won’t,” said Moira, flatly.

Rei shoved Aedan’s head forward more, causing him to gag a little with all the pressure her forearm was putting on his neck. “Yes I will,” she said.

“My dear, all these theatrics are unnecessary,” said Moira, stepping forward.

“ _I said stay back!_ ” Rei’s voice pitched up. Even through Talon armor Aedan could feel her heart thumping with panic against his back. 

“Let’s examine the situation, shall we?” said Moira, “You have no idea where you are. You have no idea what the layout of this facility is. If you kill your hostage, you no longer have any bargaining chip. What’s more is… you’re your mother’s daughter. I doubt you have the stomach to follow through on that threat anyway. There is no way this ends well. Your choice is how hard you’re willing to make it for yourself.”

Rei gritted her teeth. Aedan could feel her fingers tightening in his hair. “I can make it much,  _much_  harder for you,” said Rei, tightening her grip around Aedan, “Get me a transport out of here or I swear I’ll break his neck.”

Moira sighed, “You’re not fooling anyone, dear,” she said, almost pityingly, “The saddest part is how you think you actually have a hostage.” Moira made eye-contact with Aedan then, “For goodness’ sake, stop  _toying_  with the poor girl and get over here.”

Somehow it hadn’t occurred to Aedan that he still hadn’t faded all this time. A part of him was still processing, “ _Rei, it’s Rei,_ ” but as soon as Moira made eye contact with him, he realized he was the one holding up the situation. He faded, his body turning to smoke and slipping from Rei’s grip easily. With his form incorporeal, several guards fired as Aedan reformed next to Moira’s side. Aedan turned around just in time to see Rei swaying where she stood, several tranquilizer darts embedded in her torso. She stared at Aedan, who still had some smoke coming off of him from fading.

“You too…” Rei said quietly, “She… gave it to you too….”

She slumped to the floor unconscious and Moira let out a long and exhausted sigh. “Well that was an ordeal,” Moira muttered before turning on her heel to face the rest of the guards, “All right–I said  _constant sedation._  Who disregarded my instructions?”

“They gave her enough to down a horse,” said one of the troopers.

“Her body is a raging cesspool of biotics–you have to account for the accelerated metabolism with that. Did  _no one_  read my memo?”

The Talon troopers stood around sheepishly.

“Unbelievable,” Moira said with a roll of her eyes. She turned toward Aedan, “Are you all right,  _a thaisce?”_

“Yeah…” said Aedan, “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Stay in the lab next time,” said Moira, touching a hand to his shoulder before kissing his forehead.

“Rei’s the asset,” said Aedan, still trying and failing to process what had just happened.

“Yes,” said Moira, “I suppose there’s no use dancing around it now… Our team picked her up in the London attack.”

“…what are we going to do with her?” said Aedan.

“Oh,  _a thaisce,_ ” said Moira, smoothing his hair, “We’re going to change the world.”


	29. Breach Pt. 2

Genji’s eyes snapped open with a start to the familiar lights of the watchpoint infirmary.

“Easy!” Mercy said as he jerked and winced in the infirmary bed, “Easy…” she put a hand on his shoulder.

“What happened—London—?” Genji looked around.

“There was an EMP attack at the memorial,” said Tracer, standing at the foot of his bed, “It… took a pretty heavy toll on your prosthetics.”

“Master?!” Genji spoke in alarm.

“Zenyatta’s hard drive is responsive, but repairing his body is taking some time,” said Mercy.

“ _Kuso…_ ” Genji swore under his breath, then suddenly perked up in alarm, “Rei wasn’t hurt, was she?” said Genji.

Mercy wasn’t making eye contact with him.

“Angela—” Genji sat up in bed, “Where is Rei?”

Mercy’s mouth tightened and tears welled up in her eyes.

“Angela?!” Genji put his hands on her shoulders.

“Talon took her,” Tracer said, and Genji broke his sight away from Angela to look at Tracer. “It… it was a fake-out,” Tracer went on, “I thought they were trying to assassinate Zenyatta… but… by the time I figured it out…” she trailed off, “…I wasn’t fast enough.”

“Do we know where she is?” said Genji.

Tracer’s eyes met his and her brow crinkled. She didn’t know. Angela didn’t know either.

“Several miles outside Reykjavik,” Hanzo’s voice cut through the air and the three of them all looked over to see him in the doorway of the infirmary.

“What?” Mercy and Genji spoke up at the same time.

“How–How do you know?” said Tracer as Hanzo walked over.

Hanzo made eye contact with Mercy and something seemed to shift in his expression. A slight twitch of the eyebrow that told her  _‘You’re not going to like this.’_  He took a deep breath and folded his arms, “You…uh… you may remember a couple of months back when Rei got her wisdom teeth removed–”

“You had a chip put in my daughter,” said Mercy.

“…I didn’t activate it,” said Hanzo, “It was… a precaution.” Mercy kept a skeptical gaze on him, “Rei has the dragon,” Hanzo said firmly, “You can’t simply let a Shimada dragon run around unaccounted for.”

Mercy huffed. “We’ll need to talk about this later, I supposed for now, we need to figure out what our next step is…”

“…and what Talon’s plan for Rei is,” said Hanzo.

—-

“Changing the world?” said Aedan as an unconscious Rei was lugged up onto a wheeled stretcher and a labtech hurried in with another IV.

“Leveling the playing field—call it what you will,” said Moira with a shrug, “Overwatch already has two people capable of wielding the Shimada dragons–that hardly seems fair, doesn’t it?”

“So… Rei’s going to join our side?” said Aedan. He remembered the look on Rei’s face, the pure fear and revulsion at finding out who his mother was. “ _She’s a Talon psycho! She’s a monster!”_  he remembered Rei’s words in the elevator back in Oasis. “…it’s going to take a lot of convincing,” he said quietly.

“Lucky for us we’re very persuasive,” said Moira with a smile.

“Do you think Project Widow can still proceed with this level of sedation?” one of the labtechs said, inserting the IV needle into Rei’s arm and taping it down.

“Project Orphan. We’re calling it Project  _Orphan,_ ” said another labtech, “God, what  _year_  are you living in?” 

“We won’t know until we get the EEG scanners set up again,” said Moira, “Get her back to Lab 9, I’ll rejoin you in a bit.” She looked to Aedan, “You’ve had a bit of a shock, Aedan. You should take it easy for the rest of the day.”

“Right,” said Aedan, walking off.

—

Aedan didn’t take it easy.

He scrolled through a terminal in the lab records room. “Project… Widow…” Aedan said, typing into the archives before leaning back in his seat. A single file appeared on the screen, and he had seen it before. A lab report on Amélie Lacroix. It was all text–just notes on sedative levels and physical responsiveness, various nutrient intakes and EEG scans. Still, it ended with the final notes of  _“Subject Amelie Lacroix has successfully adapted to Mnemosyne’s treatments and should be field ready within the next few weeks, should physical conditioning show equal success.”_

“Mnemosyne,” said Aedan, typing the name into the archives, “I’ve seen that before.”

 Two files appeared on the screen now— ‘Project Widow’ and ‘Subject Six.’ He knew Subject Six. He opened the file, where dozens of document files and audio files were. He knew these files well. He opened a video file.

_“Good morning subject six!”_  Moira’s voice was downright chipper as the camera zoomed in on an Amnio-tank where a cluster of black cells were shaping and re-shaping themselves. Moira gave a sigh of satisfaction.  _“Subject Six is showing marked improvement in cellular integrity compared to his predecessors. I think I should increase the calcium intake just so–”_  Aedan clicked out of the video and opened a much later file. There wasn’t a cluster of black cells suspended in the amnio-tank, but rather what appeared to be a five-year old boy, parts of his body dissolving into black and reshaping themselves.

_“Artificial aging is proceeding smoothly,”_ Moira’s voice sounded over the video,  _“I’ve gotten permission to take the Mnemosyne out of cold storage so that Subject Six–Aedan… So that Aedan can have a childhood. Seeing as he hasn’t actually ever been conscious, there should be no resistance to Mnemosyne’s treatments,”_  He saw Moira’s hand press against the glass of the amnio-tank.  _“I can give him everything I never had. I owe him that much, bringing him in to all this.”_

“Heartwarming, isn’t it?” a gravelly voice spoke behind Aedan and Aedan nearly jumped a foot out of his seat.

“Is sneaking up and scaring people all you’re good for anymore?” muttered Aedan bitterly, glancing over his shoulder at Reaper before turning back to the monitor.

“It’s not going to be like that for her,” said Reaper, stepping forward, “You’re watching your own baby videos—” he gave a glance to the screen with some revulsion, “Well… the closest thing you ever had to baby videos—so you can negotiate and rationalize what they’re about to do to her.”

“They did it to me—” Aedan started.

“They did it to a blank slate that  _became_  you,” said Reaper. He set down a small data drive on the desk next to Aedan, “You need to see what happens when that tech is used on someone who’s already  _someone._ ”

Aedan looked at the data drive, then looked at Reaper. “What are you trying to accomplish with this?” he asked.

“If you’re going to be a part of this organization, there are things that you’re going to have to learn to live with,” Reaper pointed at the data drive, “That’s one of them.” With that he turned around and walked off.

“Creepy, decrepit old…” Aedan muttered under his breath as he picked up the data drive and plugged it into the terminal, “ _’Things you’re going to have to learn to live with,’”_  he imitated the gravel of Reaper’s voice then scoffed, “Please,” he said with a roll of his eyes as a window with several video files opened on screen. He opened one of the video files to see a pale woman with dark strapped down to a table wailing and rapidly talking in French. Aedan typed in a ‘Translate Audio’ command.

_“Please–Please–I don’t know anything—I can’t tell you anything–I don’t know anything about my husband’s work–I have money—My family has money—Overwatch has money—I haven’t recognized anyone’s face–You can let me go–”_ she was hyperventilating and straining against her straps _, “Please don’t kill me, oh god, please—”_

_“We’re not going to kill you, Mrs. LaCroix,”_  a calm voice spoke from behind the camera.

_“I don’t KNOW anything!”_  she wailed,  _“Gérard never talks about his work–”_  

_“Please hold still–”_ the calm voice spoke again, but she broke out into a full on panic now, her limbs writhing desperately.

_“What–? No! What are you doing?!”_ A labtech was approaching her with some kind of headgear with dozens of wires trailing off of it, as another approached her with a large syringe, her body spasmed as the syringe went into her neck and the apparatus was brought down on her head, _“No–Get away from me! Let me go! No! Stop it! STOP IT! PLEASE! MAKE IT STOP! GÉRARD! GÉRARD! PLEASE MAKE IT STOP–”_

Aedan closed out of the video, then looked at the other videos in the file. He swallowed hard and clicked the next one. The next one was of Amelie Lacroix, sitting in a chair. Her eyes had changed, no longer wild with panic.

_“Word association and response test,”_  a voice offscreen spoke,  _“Trial Seven.”_

_“I understand,”_  Amélie’s voice was flat,  _“Please proceed.”_

_“Cause.”  
_

_“Effect.”  
_

_“Order.”  
_

_“Task.”_

_“Mission.”  
_

_“Priority.”  
_

_“Life.”  
_

_“Expendable.”_

_“Hero.”  
_

_“Lie.”_

_“Overwatch.”  
_

_“Enemy.”  
_

_“Gérard.”  
_

_“Husband.”_

Amélie suddenly jolted and spasmed in her seat as an electrical buzz was heard, and Aedan flinched back in his owns seat at her severe convulsions before she was still again, head hanging down.

_“I’m sorry…”_  Amélie said softly,  _“I’m sorry…”_

_“Prep Mnemosyne for another treatment,”_  the same offscreen voice spoke.

_“You don’t have to do that,”_  she looked up at the camera with hollow eyes. Her expression was blank but a tear ran down from one eye and dripped off her chin, the rest of her face shrouded by her dark hair,  _“You don’t have to do that. I’ll kill him. I’ll do it. Please don’t put me in that thing again.”_

_“You need to understand, Widow, there can be no hesitation.”_

_“I’ll do it. Please. I’ll be good. I’ll be perfect.”_

_“We know you’ll be,”_  the voice off screen spoke comfortingly before Amélie spasmed and thrashed in her seat with electric shocks again. Aedan closed out of the video and looked to the third one. He took a deep breath and opened that one.

The next video was of Amélie standing calmly on top of a plastic tarp, a handgun in one hand. A whimpering man with a bag over his head was brought in from offscreen and shoved down to his knees in front of her. Amélie considered the man with a bag on his head with a blank face.

_“Trial nine,”_  the voice offscreen spoke. An electric chime was heard, Widowmaker put her gun to the bag and fired. Blood spurted out the other side of the bag and the figure went limp on the ground.

_“.19 seconds. Good. Getting there. Bring in the next prisoner.”_

Aedan paused the video and then sat in his seat silently for a few minutes. “…someone who’s already someone,” he said quietly. He remembered a girl in a yellow dress in oasis, bright eyes and wild hair. He looked at Amélie LaCroix on the video, frozen in time and dead behind the eyes and for a heartbeat the images of the two women were superimposed on each other. The light out of Rei’s eyes. 

_It’s not going to be like that for her._

_There are things you’re going to have to learn to live with._

_Not Project Widow, Project Orphan._

_Lucky for us we’re very persuasive._

Aedan stood up, knocking his chair back, and took off running. Lab 9. He had to get to Lab 9. He didn’t even know what he would  _do_  when he got to Lab 9. He pushed past labtechs and guards, reeled sharply around corners, even faded briefly to avoid several labtechs pushing a large dolly with old Omnic tech on it down the hall. After a few minutes of harried sprinting with absolutely no idea what he was going to do when he would get there, he noticed several labtechs hurrying alongside him.  _Another breach?_  he thought,  _No, there would be guards if it were another breach_. He skidded to a halt on his heels alongside a group of several other labtechs standing at the observation window looking into Lab 9. One of the labtechs was screaming, holding a stump of a wrist.

“What the hell is that thing!?” the labtech shouted hysterically.

“Holy shit…” one of the Labtechs said, looking in on the window.

Rei was strapped down to the table, eyes closed, but with ribbons of yellow light coiled around her.

“Stop being a coward and get Mnemosyne on her,” said Moira.

“With that shit coming off of her?! It just took off Capęk’s hand!” shouted another labtech.

“Then  _sedate_  her,” Moira said with an eyeroll, “Use the tranq darts if you must.”

“We pump any more into her and her EEG is going to drop below the threshold for Mnemosyne to have any effect,” said another labtech, “It would be like trying to brainwash a rock.”

Moira did a half-scoffing snarl and threw her hands up. “Fine,” she said, “This session is scrubbed. Get Capęk cleaned up and re-sterilize the lab. We’ll attempt again when we’ve figured out a way to circumvent…” she gestured at Rei and the lights coming off of her, “…that. Bloody Shimada… ‘The dragon becomes me’ indeed,” she muttered, shrugging her labcoat off of her shoulders. Aedan faded and disappeared down the hall before Moira could see him outside the lab.

—-

Aedan observed the nanite amalgams in his lab. He wrote reports and analyses. He read. He listened to his music. He cleaned out Creggan’s hutch. He cleaned his room. He stared at his walls and pondered posters and fairy lights and yet a part of him felt like he was only puppeting himself, forcing himself to go through whatever motions he could go through, like disassociating from himself was all he could to keep back a massive, oppressive wall of burning, rotten  _feeling._  Occasionally the thoughts slipped in to his conscious mind.

_They’re going to lobotomize her._

_They’re going to kill everything that makes her her._

_They’re going to make her destroy everything she once loved._

_And you have to live with this._

_This is one of the things you have to live with._

His stomach was in knots and he distracted himself by fixing dinner. He was a good cook. Cooking was just chemistry, after all. Heat catalyzing reactions. Salt, fat, acid. It was an intersection of science and creativity that he could distract himself with. He was squeezing lemon over two plates seared chicken and arugula when Moira entered the apartment with a huff and bitterly kicked off her shoes, muttering under her breath in Irish.

“Good timing,” Aedan tried to inject as much cheeriness into his voice as possible as Moira stretched and rolled her shoulders, her brow furrowed with frustration. He held up a plate and her expression instantly softened.

“Oh  _a thaisce…_ ” Moira’s hand went over her chest, “What would I do without you?” she said as he set the plates down at their little dinner table.

“I assume cold cereal with a side of sleep deprivation,” said Aedan, smiling a little and grabbing an already-opened bottle of riesling from the fridge and pouring a glass for each of them.

“You’re a chancer,” Moira said with a grin, elbowing him.

“Rough day, I take it?” Aedan said, as they took their seats.

“Abysmal,” Moira pushed her red hair, graying in some spots, back from her face, “I’ve a mind to just send you off to Oasis if Talon is going to insist on continuing to saddle me with these sorry excuses of lab assistants.” She brought her elbow on the table and rested her chin in her hand as she sipped her wine, “It’s not their fault, I know that. You’ve no idea how frustrating it is… the very thing you acquired an asset for being the one thing that keeps you from  _using_  that asset.”

“What do you mean?” said Aedan with semi-feigned ignorance. He knew what she meant.

“Bloody Shimada dragon,” said Moira, fiercely forking some arugula and taking a bite, “There are so many laws of physics and physiology that it breaks and yet–Oh  _a thaisce_ , you’ve outdone yourself—”

“Thank you,” said Aedan as Moira washed down her arugula with another sip of riesling.

“Where was–Oh yes. So many laws of physics and physiology that it breaks and I’ve spent  _hours_  reviewing what little footage we have of her father and uncle and it only leaves us with more questions than answers.” 

“It must be a sight to see, though,” said Aedan.

“It’s…” Moira grimaced, “…bright,” she said, “It took Capęk’s hand clean off, so we know it’s  _useful._ But the way it behaves…It’s able to activate itself almost independently of her… like an immunoresponse, almost, but…” Moira sighed, “Here I go prattling on. Taking my work home with me.”

“…we live where you work,” said Aedan with a slight smile.

Moira chuckled, “So we do,” she said. The smile shrank from her face as she eyed Aedan’s plate. “…You’ve barely touched your food,” she said.

“Mm?” Aedan found that he was just pushing his arugula salad around the plate.

Moira huffed, “Here I am going on about this wretched girl when she was threatening to break your neck just hours ago. I’m no good with people, it seems… not even people like me.”

“It’s fine,” Aedan said with a shrug.

“No, it’s not. I’m sorry about that ordeal earlier,” she sipped her wine, “…monstrous girl.”

Aedan remembered the look in Rei’s eyes and the sensation of her heart thumping against his back. “…she was terrified,” the words slipped out of him.

Moira stopped mid-sip and looked at him skeptically. “…are you feeling all right?” she asked.

Aedan bit the inside of his lip. “…I’ll be fine,” he said, picking up his plate, “I’ll… I’ll eat this later.” he said, scraping his plate into tupperware and putting it in the refrigerator. Aedan lingered at the refrigerator, staring into it.

“…say you can’t use Mnemosyne on her,” said Aedan, “Say… there’s no way to brainwash her. What then?”

“Well I suppose we’ll have to cut our losses and take a new approach,” said Moira with a shrug.

“So… we’d give her back to Overwatch?” said Aedan.

Moira nearly spat out her wine then. “Give her  _back?_  A girl with the Shimada dragon? Aedan, she’s a weapon that we can’t afford to give them.”

“Right–” said Aedan, “Of course.”

“We’ll have to find out all we can from her before we dispose of her…” said Moira.

“…You mean vivisection,” Aedan said quietly.

“Yes, if Mnemosyne doesn’t take, we’ll vivisect her,” said Moira.

“I–” Aedan paled briefly, “We can’t just kill her!”

“We aren’t just killing her, that’s what vivisection  _means_ ,” said Moira, “Besides,” she spiraled her wrist and a biotic orb alighted on it, glowing yellow, “We can keep her alive as long as we need.”


	30. Breach Pt. 3

Aedan couldn’t sleep. He figured it was the empty stomach. His dinner was still in the fridge. He walked to the kitchen, opened the fridge door, saw the little tupperware of chicken and arugula, grabbed it, and then the intrusive thought slipped in.

_We’ll have to find out everything we can before we dispose of her._

A wave of nausea hit him and he stuffed the tupperware back in the fridge and desperately filled a glass of water at the sink, drinking it down to try and settle his stomach. He remembered the sight of Widowmaker’s–No, Amélie’s wrists straining at the straps in the lab footage. He heard his mother’s voice.

_We can keep her alive as long as we need._

Aedan coughed and spluttered at the image that slipped into his mind then. He set the glass down on the kitchen counter and braced his hands on the counter’s edge. 

_There are things you’re going to have to learn to live with._

Aedan shook his head and walked back to his room, running his fingers through his hair. He paused by the door of his mother’s bedroom and office, glancing in only briefly to see Moira perched in her chair with a large pair of headphones on, furrowing her brow at her monitor—no doubt reviewing all the lab footage from that day and trying to figure out a workaround. She didn’t even look up from her screen as he continued on to his own room. She’d be up well into the small hours of the morning, no doubt. Aedan entered his room and closed the door behind him. He laid on his bed and stared at the ceiling. He gave a glance over to Creggan’s hutch on the wall opposite his desk. The rabbit regarded him with a steady glassy red stare.

“…Don’t look at me like that,” he muttered to the rabbit before looking at the ceiling again. He remembered being in Rei’s grip, her short panicked breaths on the side of his face. 

_There’s no way this ends well. Your choice is how hard you’re willing to make it for yourself._

_She’s a weapon we can’t afford to give them._

_A weapon. She’s a weapon. She’s not a girl in a yellow dress smiling with the wind in her hair. She’s a monster who threatened to break your neck. She’s–_

The train of thought was brought to a screeching halt by the memory of Rei sitting next to him on a bench in the Hassoun Gardens.

_“My parents,”_ she was saying,  _“They’re always talking about how their families and the Omnic Crisis put them on a path that they were never sure they wanted. They always tell me they want me to be able to choose but it’s like… I know what they _don’t_ want for me, but as far as what  _I_  want…”  
_

He cut the memory short with dozens of nattering, bitter, desperate thoughs.

_That was a lie. She lies. She’s a ninja. Ninjas lie. She’s a weapon. Weapons aren’t supposed to have choices. She’s a weapon and Talon needs to either find a way to use that weapon or destroy it._

_But they’re not destroying it. They’re going to try and destroy her mind and if it doesn’t work they’re going to cut her open over and over and over again until–_

_Shut up shut up shut up shut up._

_You know the facility. You could–_

_No. No. Not an option. Not happening._

_You have access to the guards’ shift tables. You have the biofeed. You can see them coming. You could find an opening. No one would even have to know._

_Not listening. Not listening_ _._

_Getting to her wouldn’t be the problem–Getting her out would. Uniforms. She’d need a uniform. Labtech and assassin. Faces are covered, it’s perfect. If you accessed the logistics terminal and wrote in a distress call from the Reykjavik offices then they’d scramble the dropships and—_

_This is crazy. You’re crazy. This isn’t happening and you aren’t thinking about this._

Aedan squeezed his eyes shut. He needed noise. He needed to drown the thoughts out until all this mess was over.

 “Play playlist three,” he spoke to the apartment’s AI.

“Resuming playlist three,” the AI responded.

“Resuming–?” Aedan started and his room’s speakers started playing.

_“—We can be HEROES! Just for one da-aaay! We can be HE–”_

“Skip,” Aedan said, his stomach in knots. That was probably the worst possible song that could come on at that moment. No, actually it wasn’t. The actual worst possible song came next. There was saxophone. And piano. And bass and high-hat and “ _Everybody’s raaaaised in blindness_ ”

  _Skip,_  his mind was screaming at him all through the first verse,  _Skip, skip skip say skip. Just say it._  But no, it was too late. He remembered a hover tram across the artificial lake of Oasis and Rei’s head on his shoulder, sharing headphones with him as the chorus kicked in.

_“Whooooo can I be noooooow you found me?”_

Aedan’s eyes opened.

“…You’re going to do something very stupid, aren’t you?” he said to himself.

–

It was a damp, still morning, the soft thrumming of the orca’s engine’s and the sound of Gibraltar’s waves melding together to make white noise. Jack was too old for this, far too old for this, he felt it in his bones, yet the SEP serum was still keeping him together after all this time.  _Most of me, at least,_  he thought, giving a glance down his left leg, an orange prosthetic from the knee down. Jack stood on the entry ramp to the Orca, and Genji stood in front of him on the watchpoint tarmac.

“You need to understand, we don’t usually do missions like this,” said Jack, “This isn’t Blackwatch. This isn’t the old Overwatch. We don’t have the resources to take the fight to Talon. We’re only doing this because they have one of our own.”

“Maybe we should have taken the fight to them,” muttered Genji, “Maybe if we had they wouldn’t—”

“Genji,” Jack put a hand on his shoulder, “You’re emotionally compromised. And that’s fair. We don’t know if we can trust you to stick to the plan once we get there, but you can trust us to get her home—”

“I’m going,” said Genji, “It’s an infiltration mission. You need me.”

“Your prosthetics are still locking up after that EMP attack,” said Jack.

“So you’ll need a medic too,” said Mercy stepping up alongside Genji, fully outfitted in her valkyrie suit.

Jack rubbed his forehead, “Doc…” he started.

“They have our daughter, Jack,” Mercy said, furrowing her brow, “But by all means, try to stop us and see how well that goes.”

A long pause passed between the three of them before Jack sighed.

“I need both you to give me your word that you’ll stick to the plan and stay calm once we get there,” said Jack.

“And if the plan starts falling apart?” said Mercy.

“Well that’s what you have  _me_  for,” said Sombra, stepping up alongside Jack, “Now if everyone’s done bickering, we should probably get going, right?” she said, heading up the ramp.

Genji, Mercy, and Jack headed up into the Orca after her, and Genji glanced over to see D.Va texting away next to her MEKA, Lúcio next to her. Lúcio gave them a slight wave.

“Thank you,” Genji said to Sombra as the orca doors closed behind them.

“Hey, you’d do the same for Marti, right?” said Sombra with a slight smile.

“In a heartbeat,” said Genji. Sombra smiled and clapped him on the shoulder. His shoulder jerked slightly at the touch, the prosthetics still not 100% sure how to react to impacts after the EMP, but it was getting better. 

“…we’re bringing D.Va and Lúcio on a covert mission?” said Genji.

“We need someone who can move in fast, take a lot of damage, and move out fast, and someone who can disrupt the enemy line,” said Jack, “Also the Meka can carry Rei if she’s… incapacitated.”

Mercy was biting the inside of her lip as she looked around the Orca. They took their seats as the Orca took off and headed towards Reykjavik. With Genji and Mercy on the team, it was a strike team of eight rather than six. Tracer was in the cockpit of the Orca, looking grim—Losing Rei on the very anniversary of Mondatta’s death had taken its toll on her. Sombra was there for intel on the Talon facility as well as infiltration–with Genji at least she wouldn’t be scouting things out alone. Hanzo, resting his eyes in the corner, would provide cover fire. Jack was there for logistics and mission oversight. D.Va was for a swift distraction and transporting Rei out if necessary. Lúcio would have been the sole medic, but now Mercy was there as well. The general air of the orca was quiet and grim. Mercy glanced down at her hands and noticed they were shaking. Genji reached over and put a hand over hers.

“We’ll get her back,” he said softly, “I promise you, we’ll get her back.”

Mercy leaned her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes. There were a few minutes of silence around the Orca as Tracer took them up higher and higher.

“All right,” Sombra said at last, once they were high enough in the air to comfortably move about the cabin, “Let’s talk about the mess we’re about to run into, shall we?” she said, bringing up a large purple screen, “According to Hanzo’s dog chip–”

“It’s not a dog chip,” Hanzo said, opening his eyes from the corner.

“Anyway, according to the GPS on the chip, Rei is being held in the heart of a Talon Research and Development facility several miles outside  Reykjavik, codenamed ‘Urdr.’”

“‘Urdr?’” repeated D.Va.

“Mythological reference. Talon’s suckers for it and the memo I hacked said no one was willing to try and pronounce ‘Urðarbrunnr.’ So it’s Urdr,” said Sombra, “They’re dramatic like that. Moving on. Lucky for us, this particular R&D facility is pure Talon. No shell corporation cover for it to draw attention to us. Talon’s worked very hard to make sure no one is aware this facility exists, so that gives us a lot of cover to carry out this op. However, that also means ridiculously high security. We’ll have to make this a night-op so there’s fewer personnel on site for us to deal with.”

“Does Rei have that kind of time?” asked Mercy.

Sombra brought up a separate purple screen, “According to their records for Widowmaker, it took them six days to break Amélie–”

“ _Break_  Amélie?!” Mercy repeated, “Wait–You think they’re going to use her to…”

“Talon making a new Widowmaker, or Widowmaker-equivalent has been a fear of ours for some time,” said Sombra, “It makes the most sense for why they would kidnap her but not kill her, since there’s not a lot Rei could actually tell them about Overwatch.” 

Mercy’s hand went over her mouth. Genji put a hand around her shoulders, just as fearful.

“But it took them six days to break Amélie, and she was a civilian,” Sombra went on, “Rei has training. She has the dragon. She’s tough. If we’re going to do this, we have to do this right because we’ll have maybe one shot at this before they realize we can track Rei and take her somewhere we can’t trace her. We’ve got one shot, and we can’t screw it up, because we’re the only chance she has of getting out of there.”

—

Lights and dark shapes wheeled overhead as Rei drifted in and out of darkness and semiconsciousness. She was cold. She couldn’t remember the last time she had been warm. She didn’t know where she was or how long she had been here. Her mind reached back to London. An attack, Zenyatta on the ground, someone had to protect him. She fought. Zenyatta wasn’t the target. Stupid girl. And now she was… 

One eye flickered open to more fluorescent lights and a masked figure in the corner of her vision, looking at a tablet. Not safe here. She had to move. Legs didn’t seem to be listening. She moved her wrist and it stopped short, aching. Straps. There were straps digging into her cheeks. A breathing mask. Not breathing. The air was sour and made her eyes heavy. Sleep. More drugs. Her eyes opened blearily. There were figures in gray and red. Masks covering their faces.

“She’s getting twitchy again,” a voice spoke.

“Up the dosage,” muttered another.

“Wait,” another voice spoke.

Rei managed to get her other eye open and she blinked a few times to see a narrow figure topped by short-cropped red hair, graying at the sides and widow’s peak standing over her. One blue eye was framed by a silvery mask.

“I think we got off on the wrong foot,” said Moira, as Rei’s vision clarified, “I think we can talk to each other civilly, don’t you?”

Rei’s hand jerked up and stopped short. She glanced down to see it secured by leather and steel.

“Where’m I?” Rei said, eyes sluggishly flicking about.

“You’re in a dream, dear,” said Moira.

“No’m not…” Rei said quietly.

“Perceptive little thing, aren’t you?” said Moira.

“You…” Rei’s eyes squinted at Moira, “…Moira.”

“A  _very_  perceptive little thing,” said Moira.

“You’re… a thief,” the words fell out of Rei. She was clinging to any thought her mind could bring up like a ship’s mast in a storm. 

Moira blinked a few times. “Excuse me?” she said, with a slight smile.

“Stole from Mom… made… horrible things….” Rei started to drift off then seemed to snap back to semi-consciousness, “Mom–!” she said with a slight start, but Moira put a hand on her shoulder, less a calming action than emphasizing all the restraints securing her to the stretcher.

“She can’t help you here,” said Moira, brushing the back of her hand along the side of Rei’s face.

“Take me back,” Rei said softly, “I want… I want to go home.”

“You  _are_  home, dear. You’ll see that, soon enough. It’ll be easier when you stop fighting. You’ll see how much we have in common.”

“…all you can do is take from Mom…” said Rei, her head lolling around.

Moira suddenly stiffened. “…what did you say?” she said.

“You just… take what Mom makes and you make it horrible… that’s… all you can do. That’s what you’re going to do to me, right? That’s…” Rei’s hand balled into a fist even in its restraints, “That’s all you can do…” 

Moira’s mouth drew to a thin line, one corner of it twitched momentarily before she spoke again. “Darling, you have no idea what I can do,” said Moira, before looking sharply over to the labtech,“Up the dosage.”

“She’s almost at the EEG threshhold for Mnemosyne,” one of the labtechs started, “If she’s conscious just a little longer—”

 “Up. The. Dosage,” said Moira.

One of the labtechs hesitantly clicked something on Rei’s IV and Rei’s eyes rolled back in her head before shutting.

“You’re going to break,” Moira said, as a little bit of drool trailed out of the corner of Rei’s mouth, “You’re going to break or you’re going to die here. We have all the time in the world. I can’t say the same for you.”

—

_If you’re going to do something stupid, may as well try to be smart about how you go about it,_ Aedan thought to himself as he tapped away at his lab terminal, He had complained to his mother plenty times before about how little he actually knew about Talon’s operations internationally, but as far as operations  _here_ , well… Aedan gave a glance to the stylized thumbnail sized blacklight tattoo on the underside of his wrist and brought it to a scanner next to the monitor. It didn’t hurt to be a VIP. Guard shifts. Agent shifts. Labtech shifts. Labtech profiles. Rei’s profile. A surprising amount was laid bare. Not Rei’s lab videos–he imagined for the same reason he didn’t have access to the lab videos for ‘Project Widow.’ But her personal effects brought with her when she was captured were, surprisingly, not incinerated yet. He figured as far as finding resources to get her out of here, there was a good place to start.

There were a surprising amount of areas of Urdr open to him as well, including the storage lockers and the armory. He easily accessed the effects confiscated from Rei, finding clothing–a yellow ochre dress, some olive green leggings, socks and canvas sneakers, and a bra. There was her hair ribbon as well, which he pocketed, figuring she’d want something to tie her hair back with.

“No comms, no weapons,” muttered Aedan, rifling through the dress’s pockets, “Thought you were supposed to be a ninja…”

A small metal sound hit the floor next to the locker and Aedan glanced down to see a small gold object gleaming against the gray of the floor. He stooped and picked it up, seeing it was a small pendant on a thin chain. He squinted at the pendant. It seemed terribly worn down, but he could make out a nearly rubbed-out circular shape atop some… wings? An older version of the Valkyrie suit’s symbol, perhaps? He shrugged and pocketed the necklace, leaving the rest of the civilian clothes back in the locker. Something this old and worn had to have some sentimental value.

From there, it was a simple matter of cross-referencing which Talon agents fit Rei’s measurements, which Talon labtechs fit his own measurements, and which were currently out on assignment in other parts of the world, visiting the armory, punching in their ID number, and boom: Some new-car-smelling Talon assassin and labtech armor was pushed out by the automated armorer. And that was another thing– how much he was able to just… walk around the facility without anyone  _questioning_  him. No one questioned him walking through the facility with Talon assassin and labtech armor under each arm. No one questioned him tucking the Talon assassin and labtech armor into his locker. It had never occurred to him that being Moira’s son was a position of power. He had been so used to the murmurs of ‘That clone thing’ and ‘Moira’s special little project’ that it never occurred to him what it meant that he was  _Moira’s_  special little project.

 So much loyalty was assumed by virtue of the memories Moira implanted in him. In a way, it was… depressing, stressful even. In a sense, he knew he was an extension of his mother. He knew that she had given him her qualities to question and challenge everything. They had made a scientist, not a soldier, but so assured was Moira in her own way of thinking that the fact that he might be working counter to her goals was… impossible. There was another explanation, and the idea that he might be working against Talon was so  _unimaginable_  that even when he was doing things he considered out of the ordinary and worthy of questioning, they were not questioned. He got nearly everything he needed to do to get Rei out of there done by little past the afternoon, but there were still loose ends. He needed a distraction. Something bigger than Rei. Something to overwhelm the facility.

He sat in the lab for hours, wracking his brain. What.  _What_  could he do that couldn’t be traced back to him that would cause a big enough distraction to get Rei out of here? Nothing to burn the whole facility down, no, of course not.

“Incoming Call from Seye Ogundimu,” the Lab AI spoke.

“Accepted,” said Aedan.

_“Eeeeyyyyy Twiggy!”_  Seye’s voice came on the line.

“Beefcake,” Aedan said in turn.

There was a snort on the other end.  _“How’s Iceland?”_

“Surprisingly not very icy,” said Aedan, “Thailand?”

_“Pretty Thai…”_  said Seye.

“Good,” said Aedan, “Good to hear some can keep it consistent.

_“Who are you talking to?”_  a slightly French accented voice came on the line,  _“Oh– The clone. Carry on.”_

“Who was that?” said Aedan.

_“Oh it’s Faustine. Don’t worry about her. She’s just here to judge your immortal soul,”_ said Seye.

_“You’re hilarious,”_ said Faustine, flatly.

“Oh no worries at all,” said Aedan, “Clone, remember? And ginger at that. Nary a soul to be seen.” 

Seye snorted again.  _“So how’s Urdr treating you?”_

“A bit gloomy compared to Oasis,” said Aedan, turning around in his swivel chair, “But I suppose it doesn’t matter to the Amalgams,” he said, looking around the lab, “So it’s as good as any.”

_“You’re still working with those blobby things?”_  said Seye.

“Until we can get Reyes stable, yes, we’re still working with the blobby things,” said Aedan with a slight eye roll.

There was a huff on Seye’s end.  _“Just be careful, all right? I know–scientist, and all, but you remember what happened last Halloween.”_

There was a beat and Aedan’s face lit up. “Yes…” he said, “I do remember.”

_“…had to break out the flamethrowers and everything….”_  said Seye.

“Yes…” said Aedan.

_“We’re going to be late,”_  Faustine spoke up again. 

_“Yeah yeah, I’ll be there,”_  said Seye,  _“Hey, I gotta go. Take care of yourself, all right?”_

“Yeah,” said Aedan, “I will.”

_“Later!”_  Seye’s voice sounded over the comm before cutting out.

“Later,” said Aedan, knowing Seye wouldn’t hear him.

Aedan’s eyes flicked to the nanite amalgams in their glass tubes lining the walls. 

“…Right,” he said softly.

—

Aedan was back at the facility apartment well before Moira. He cooked, as he liked. Portobello mushrooms with poached eggs and spinach. Something with a decent amount of attention and skill. Moira had to practically drag herself through the door.

“Wretched girl,” Moira muttered under her breath. Not a greeting. Not addressed to him, but he took it as one all the same.

“Asset proving difficult again, I take it?” said Aedan, putting two plates down on the table.

“She has the worst of both of them,” Moira muttered as Aedan placed a glass of riesling in front of her, “You can just tell. A spiteful, monstrous little creature.”

“Figures as such,” said Aedan with a shrug.

Moira looked down at her plate. “Oh…  _A thaisce_ …” she said, running her hand through her graying red hair, “It’s lovely.” 

“I figured it would be another stressful day for you,” said Aedan with a smile, “Might want something easy on the stomach.”

Moira sectioned off her mushroom and egg, yellow yolk bleeding out onto her plate, “Sometimes I wonder if you’re the only thing I ever got right,” she said quietly.

“I’m not perfect,” Aedan said with a shrug.

“But you’re human,” said Moira, taking a bite of her food, “Or… at least what humans should be.”

“…I wish you’d met better humans in your life, Mum,” said Aedan, eating his own food much more easily this time, “I don’t think I’m that high of a bar.”

Moira snickered a little. “Don’t worry about me. We’re going to change things,” she said, some firmness in her voice, some confidence, “I promise you that much.”

Aedan just smiled and nodded.

They finished their dinner. Aedan did the dishes. Moira excused herself to her room to look over more lab footage and review correspondence. Aedan almost felt a little bad at how easily he he was able to tell what would happen next. Moira was curled up on her bed within the hour, fully dressed, deeply asleep. Of course that was to be expected with the near all-nighter she pulled before. He knew he wouldn’t have another window like this. He walked out of the apartment.

 He headed to Urdr lockers. He got into the labtech clothing, slipping the necklace into the pocket of his labcoat, put on the mask, surgical cap, and goggles, and headed down the halls to Lab 9 with the assassin armor under his arm. He made a point of stopping and talking with other labtechs on the way, making a shell game of it, changing his position in the hallway, handing the armor to the other labtech and asking if it felt too heavy, changing position with them, then taking it back and continuing on his way to Lab 9.  He glanced at his watch on the way there. 9:41. One Labtech on duty. He opened the door to Lab 9 and strolled in. The labtech wasn’t even looking at Rei, and why would he be? She was just as unconscious as before. He was fiddling away at his comm, no doubt texting about more interesting things, and Aedan couldn’t blame him for that. Aedan didn’t have to be in view of the camera’s lens to unplug it. The labtech didn’t even look up at Aedan apparently stretching in the direction of the security camera. The Labtech did make the effort to glance up and put his comm away as Aedan approached him, though.

“Sturluson?” the labtech said, “I thought they had you at the labsite in–”

Aedan put a hand on the labtech’s shoulder and his own abilities and the biotic rig did the rest. Aedan’s breath shuddered slightly, sucking energy right out of the labtech’s muscles and nervous system until the labtech dropped to the floor, unconscious. Aedan rolled his wrist. “Nothing personal,” he said quietly, before stepping next to the stretcher where Rei was strapped down. He looked her over a moment. She seemed to be mostly unharmed. No visible bruising. They had wrapped her up in one of their on-site operating gowns, a slightly more dignified step up from a typical hospital gown with fasteners in the front and back, as well as along the shoulders, but… still a hospital gown. Not something she could just run around the facility in. He put the assassin armor down on her stomach, and she was about as responsive as a pile of gravel. He worked quietly and efficiently, undoing the anesthetic mask from Rei’s face, unstrapping her wrists, taking her arm, gingerly pulling the needle of the IV of sedatives out, snapping the needle off, stopping the tube off and re-taping it down so it appeared as if she still had an IV in it for any other guards or labtechs he might run into coming out of here. He re-strapped her wrists down–just for the time being. If the restraints were off it would rouse suspicion.

“And here…” he unlocked the wheels of her stretcher, “We go,” he said, having to throw far more of his weight than he thought he’d have to against the stretcher to move it forward. He grunted with the effort of simply moving it across the lab, then he had to negotiate with opening the door, stretching awkwardly over Rei to reach the panel next to it, then struggling with the door sliding shut on the stretcher several times as he attempted to push the stretcher through, then he himself getting clipped by the door when he attempted to get through the door as well.. He huffed, not panting–he could have panted but he really didn’t want to admit how much that last effort had put him out of breath– before taking Rei’s stretcher and moving down the hall. Rei was (thankfully) unconscious through all of this. “Okay,” Aedan said quietly to himself, “Just need to get you to my lab before–”

Rei groaned a little in her sleep.

“…Before you wake up,” said Aedan quietly, and then began pushing her stretcher harder and moving faster, “Mum really wasn’t kidding about that dragon metabolism thing, was she?”

“‘zmum…” Rei mumbled from the stretcher.

“No, no, we’re not talking, you’re still asleep,” said Aedan, moving the stretcher a little faster. He had to get to his own lab. He had put the security cameras on a loop there. It would give them time.

“Hey–” another labtech stepped up alongside the stretcher, “Do we have clearance to move the asset?”

“ _I_  have clearance,” said Aedan, lying, continuing to push the stretcher, his lab was close, “But if you want to take it up with Moira at the on-site residences, be my guest. You know how she loves people interrupting her in her spare time.”

“…Do you need a hand?” said the labtech.

“Do you have clearance?” asked Aedan.

The Labtech immediately shut up at this and continued on his way. Aedan wasn’t sure how much time he had bought himself.

“Nnh…” Rei’s brow furrowed.

“Still asleep,” Aedan said to himself, rushing the stretcher down the halls, “Just a little longer…” he said as they reached his own lab. It was another painful bit of maneuvering with the sliding door and the panel and getting the stretcher through (the stretcher really was meant to be pushed by  _two_  people), before finally getting Rei into his own lab and buckling over to catch his breath and try and calm his nerves. “Okay,” he said to himself, “Okay. Okay. Step one. Done. Step two–”

Rei groaned a little from the stretcher. Aedan exhaled, then walked over and unstrapped her wrists, then the straps across her chest and waist and legs. Rei was mumbling sleepily as the straps came off. She stirred slightly and Aedan flinched back from the straps at her ankles before stepping over to better look at her face. Aedan could see her eyes moving beneath her lids, unsure if it was REM sleep. Her lips were parted but her jaw was tight. He noticed a crusty line of dried drool leading down her cheek from the corner of her mouth and unthinkingly brought up a gloved hand and began gently flaking it off with his thumb. 

Her eyes flicked open.

Then flicked to him.

 He was stunned for half a second, his thumb still on her cheek. “Uh… hey,” he started.

She punched him in the face.

The labtech mask absorbed most of the shock of the blow but still it was strong enough to send him reeling back, the labtech goggles cracked in one lens from the strike. Rei sat bolt upright, then swayed from the rush of blood from her head, pressing her hands to her forehead, then glanced down at the straps still on her ankles and began feverishly getting them off. She was terrified, disoriented. She moved to get off the straps and then moved to scramble off of the stretcher, but her movements were clumsy, sluggish, and imbalanced.

“Wait–Wait!” Aedan rushed over, managing to catch her before she fell to the floor, supporting her upper torso as it hung off the stretcher.

“Get off of me!” she said, trying to shove him back. Even with all the drugs in her system she was incredibly strong and it was a struggle just to keep her from tumbling to the floor.

“Listen–” Aedan tried to calm her down but she was still scrambling in his grip, “Just listen to me for one second!” Rei looked into his eyes, into the cracked labtech goggles, fight-or-flight still flashing in her own eyes when Aedan said,  _“Who do you think undid those straps!?”_

Rei paused, then looked at the straps on her stretcher, then to him.

“Just…” Aedan pushed her weight back slightly so that she was centered on the stretcher again before taking a step away from her and bringing his hands up, “It’s okay,” he said, slowly reaching into his labcoat pocket and pulling out her necklace and hair ribbon. He took a tentative step forward and set the necklace and hair ribbon down on the stretcher next to her. She quickly snatched them up, clutching them both to her chest before looking back at him, brow crinkled in confusion. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said calmly.

“What is this?!” said Rei, “What’s going on!?”

Aedan took a deep breath, then took off the surgical cap, labtech mask, and goggles. Rei’s eyes widened at finally seeing his face.

“…Aedan?” said Rei.

“This is a rescue,” said Aedan, “I’m getting you out of here.”

A long pause passed between them.

“What?” said Rei.


	31. Breach Pt. 4

Night had fallen on the Urdr Lab facility. Two talon guards walked the outer perimeter, calmly chatting.

“Everything’s sequels and reboots these days. It’s bullshit,” said Talon Enforcer 3939 Callsign ‘Tyrian.’ 

“Woah,  _someone’s_  bitter,” said Talon Trooper 4783 Callsign ‘Rosso,’ “I dunno–I’d still want to see it.”

“Look, nothing’s going to top the original run—Mid-crisis, shoestring budget, skeleton film crew–Old school Midori Rider had heart. It  _meant_  something to try and tell a story like that when the world was going to shit. It’s just a cash grab at this point,” said Tyrian.

“But  _girl_  Midori Rider though—That’s interesting. We’re kind of due for it, you know?” said Rosso.

“They want to make a female-led Sentai show they’re welcome to it, they don’t need to dry-hump Midori Rider to do it. It’s just Glitchbot struggling to stay relevant,” said Tyrian. 

“See I think it would be cool to get kids into the show, then they could get into the older versions and–” Rosso stopped suddenly, “Did you hear something?”

“Maaaybe it’s the faaaairiiiies,” said Tyrian with a snicker.

“Come off it—” said Rosso.

“You know that’s how Talon got this land so cheap, right?” said Tyrian, “None of the locals wanted to build here and—”

“Tyr–hold up,” Rosso brought a hand to the side of his helmet, “Lilla–have you seen any movement in the western quadrant?” There was only dead air on the other end. “Huh…” Rosso brought his hand away from his helmet, “Must be on break?”

Tyrian shrugged.  “Anyway,” Tyrian went on, “None of the locals wanted to build here because apparently this was ‘fairy land’ and that’s how you end up with prime geothermal real estate so—” 

An arrow suddenly pierced through Tyrian’s neck.

“What the—” it took Rosso a half-beat to register that Tyrian was gurgling and bleeding out, “Shit—” He tried to put pressure to the wound but was struggling to try and get past Tyrian’s armor without disturbing the arrow and making it worse, “Shit–” Rosso brought a hand to the side of his helmet, “Requesting back—”

A second arrow pierced through his hand, and then his helmet, the plating of both stopping the arrow as its point barely kissed his temple, the comm in his helmet had cut out from the damage of the arrow. He was screaming before a second arrow pierced them through the side and he fell to the ground, groaning, one hand pierced through and pinned to the side of their helmet. “Shit–” he was dragging himself with one arm over to Tyrian. He could activate Tyrian’s comm. Request backup. Tyrian was gone at this point, he knew that much. Rosso stretched one hand toward Tyrian’s helmet, the blood pooling between both of them, when a foot came down and stepped on his hand. The pain of having his hand crushed against the walkway was all but an afterthought compared to the arrow in his side, but Rosso craned his neck up to see a graying-haired figure standing over him. A man with a bow. 

“You–” Rosso started before another arrow split through his helmet.

Hanzo regarded the two talon guards’ corpses with a grim indifference before bringing before opening his comm. “You have your opening,” said Hanzo, “Move in now.”

“Roger!” D.Va spoke over the comm lines.

Hanzo pulled a small glowing purple translocator from his quiver and dropped it on the ground. In a flash of violet, Sombra appeared out of the translocator and instantly edged her feet away from the pooling blood. 

“Yikes…” she muttered, “Remind me to stay on your good side.”

“They have my niece,” said Hanzo, already moving forward, “The Shimada Clan would never let such a slight go unanswered. Now, if you would…”

“Gotcha,” Sombra walked across the walkway with Hanzo keeping a sharp eye out before Sombra reached a door panel, “Oh Talon networks,” she said a bit  wistfully, cracking her knuckles and bringing up a purple screen, “It’s been too long.”

“Can you hack it?” said Hanzo, frowning. 

“You know who you’re talking to, right?” said Sombra, opening up a purple screen, “Now, let’s see what we can learn…”

Hanzo heard a grunt behind him, and turned around to help Genji up onto the walkway from where he had scaled the wall.

“A lot slower than usual,” said Hanzo.

“I’ll be fine,” said Genji, circling his prosthetic arm in its socket as Mercy flew in alongside him.

“Accessing and shutting down surveillance,” said Sombra.

“Wait–” Genji walked up alongside her, “Do you see Rei anywhere?”

“Haven’t seen her yet,” murmured Sombra, scrolling through various surveillance feeds of the facility, “But it’s a big facility with a lot of—” Sombra cut herself off, then opened up a second screen. The surveillance feed on her first window had gone black, and the second screen she brought up featured a rough schematic of the facility, with a bright yellow dot just a ways off-center in it. Sombra looked between her two screens. “Wherever they’re keeping her, they’ve got the cameras off for some reason,” said Sombra.

“ _Mein gott_ –what are they  _doing_  to her!?” said Mercy, running a hand through her hair in distress.

—

“…A rescue,” said Aedan, picking up the talon assassin armor next to her, “This is a rescue. I’m…” he cleared his throat a bit awkwardly, “I’m… rescuing you.”

Rei looked at him skeptically as she rose up to a more balanced sitting-up position on the stretcher.

“I know the facility,” Aedan went on, “And I have a plan.”

“And I should trust you because…?” Rei started tying her hair back with the ribbon.

“Because it’s your only option—I mean, you  _could_  try pulling what you did yesterday–running around aimlessly through Urdr and getting nowhere before the guards tranq you again, or,” he held the assassin armor out to her, “You can put this on, follow my lead, and actually have a chance.”

“And how am I supposed to know you aren’t working with Moira?” said Rei, fastening her necklace around her neck, “That this isn’t some… sick game where I’m one of her little lab rats?”

“Rabbits,” said Aedan.

“What?” 

“We use rabbits, not–I’m getting off-point. Just—” Aedan huffed, “You don’t. You don’t know if you can trust me. And that’s fair. I just…” He brought the assassin armor up a bit more insistently, “Please let me help you.”

Rei’s eyes flicked down to the assassin armor, then up to him. Hesitantly, her movements still sluggish from all the sedatives, she took the armor.

“Why are you doing this?” said Rei.

 _They were going to obliterate your mind, and if they couldn’t do that they were going to cut you open over and over again and every time I thought of that it made me want to throw up,_  the words ran through Aedan’s mind but he couldn’t say that. He looked down. “Talon…” he said slowly, “It… wants to make a world where people aren’t held back by fear and old ideas. But if it has to brainwash people to do it… that… sort of defeats the purpose, doesn’t it?”

“Brainwash–?” Rei’s eyes widened and then she dropped the assassin armor into her lap, pressing her hands to the sides of her head, “What did they–Is that why they—!? They’re going to–?!”

 _So much for not making her panic,_  thought Aedan. “They weren’t able to do anything yet,” said Aedan, putting a hand on her shoulder but she flinched at his touch and he quickly withdrew his hand.

“How do you  _know!?_  I can barely remember anything since London!” Rei was practically hyperventilating at this point.

“They tried. Your… dragon… took a labtech’s hand off,” said Aedan.

Rei stared at him for several seconds, her eyes still wide with panic. “It can  _do_  that?!” she blurted out.

 _Really not as much of a weapon as Mum said, are you?_  thought Aedan, before saying, “I don’t know! It’s your dragon…thing! Shouldn’t you know what it does?” 

“I thought it just healed!” said Rei. 

“Well congratulations. You can also take hands off,” said Aedan, “Now we don’t have a lot of time. Can you  _please_  put this assassin uniform on?” 

Rei bit the inside of her lip, then set the armor next to her swung her legs over the edge of the stretcher.

“Easy–” Aedan held a hand out to her, “It’s been a while since you’ve been on your feet.”

She braced her forearm against his with one arm, then pushed off of the stretcher with the other. Her legs turned to jelly beneath her only momentarily, a brief stumble before she put her free hand against his shoulder to stabilize herself, before rising a bit shakily to two feet. 

“Can you stand?” said Aedan.

Rei nodded and they broke apart. Rei turned around and unfolded the talon armor from its place on the stretcher. Mindlessly, she undid one of the fasteners at the shoulder of her hospital gown, then stopped and looked over her shoulder at him.

“Do you mind?” she said, furrowing her brow.

“No,” Aedan shrugged, then immediately caught himself, “Oh! You’re getting–right–I’m just—right, I should… get to…” he pointed at one of the lab monitors over his shoulder, “Important… rescue… things.”

“Important rescue things,” Rei muttered as Aedan turned around and walked over to the lab monitor.  “So… what is this place?” asked Rei, as Aedan tapped away at the keyboard, reviewing the various security footage of the facility.

“These are the Urdr Labs. Talon’s Iceland-based R&D facility,” said Aedan, clicking through various cameras of the facility. 

“ _Iceland?!_ ” said Rei, “How long have I been here?”

Aedan counted on his fingers, “You got here around 3 AM the night before last. You’ve been here two days.”

“Feels like longer,” said Rei.

“That would be the drugs,” said Aedan, “How’s the armor?”

“…complicated,” said Rei.

“Well don’t put the gauntlets on until last. Also you need to detach the breastplate from the abdominal lames, then reattach them once the lames are around your–” Aedan looked over his shoulder mindlessly then went beet red and quickly fixed his attention back on the monitor screen. He hadn’t really seen anything. A section of her back, maybe some Pachimari-printed panties at most. But he rubbed his forehead. This whole rescue ordeal was murder on his nerves. “Once they’re around your waist,” he said, clearing his throat. 

“Is it  _supposed_  to be this tight across the ass?” muttered Rei.

“There’s a panel at the center of the belt that adjusts the waistband,” said Aedan, “Sorry… I just went by your height. They didn’t record…the other.. measurements.”

“Didn’t even get me a bra. Grabbed the hair ribbon… but the bra? Nope,” Rei was muttering under her breath.

“It didn’t… feel appropriate,” said Aedan, “It’s fine though the armor is um… it’s… supportive?”

He could feel her shooting a glare at the back of his head from across the room before she sighed and resumed fiddling around with the complicated plates of the armor.

“Are we safe here?” said Rei, looking around the lab.

“We have maybe a few more minutes at best,” said Aedan, looking through the lab footage, “I managed to put a handful of security cameras on a loop, so it should be a while before they notice you’re gone.”

“How do you know no one else is going to walk in?” asked Rei.

“This is my lab,” said Aedan a bit proudly.

Rei’s eyes trailed along the nanite amalgams in their glass tubes and tanks all along the walls. “…kind of creepy,” she said quietly.

“Wh–I’ll have you know I do very important work here!” said Aedan, whirling around, nearly stopping himself, but then finding she had the armor mostly on at this point, “Oh–here—” He got up and hurried over, helping with the last few armor latches up her back. Rei would have flinched back at his touch, but she seemed distracted by the swirling black shapes within the glass. 

“What are these things?” she asked as he got the last latch at the back of her neck secured. She broke away from him and bent over, squinting at one, “Are these… Reaper?” she said quietly. She looked over her shoulder at him, her face lit up eerily yellow by the biotic plasma the nanite amalgam was suspended in, “Are they…. you?”

“In another life, I suppose,” said Aedan with a shrug.

Rei gave him a sidelong glance. 

“Nanite amalgams,” said Aedan, “They’re masses of cells. Some organic, some not. Some derived and replicated from me, some from Reyes. We should get those gauntlets on before—” 

 _“Incoming call from Facility Residence C,”_  the computer’s AI spoke.

“…Shit,” said Aedan. He looked at Rei. “Down!” he hissed, “Get down, now!” Rei dropped to the floor, out of sight of the monitor, Aedan put a finger to his lips to signal her to be silent.

 _“Patching through—”_  said the AI as Moira appeared on the screen and Aedan attempted to compose his appearance. She looked exhausted.

 _“Aedan?”_  said Moira,  _“Are you there?”_

“Yes! Yes I’m here,” said Aedan, attempting to look as calm as possible, “Couldn’t sleep. Decided to get some work done. You know how it is.”

A weary smile tugged at the corner of Moira’s mouth.  _“Leave a note next time, will you?”_

“Oh—a note. Of course. I figured I’d be back before you woke up, so…” he trailed off, “I didn’t mean to worry you.” 

 _“I’m sorry this whole situation has you so out of sorts, a thaisce,”_  said Moira,  _“The environment here is… different from Oasis, I’ll admit, but you’ve been doing brilliantly in adjusting.”  
_

“Well… adaptation is the basis of survival, isn’t it?” said Aedan with a slight smile. He gave a short glance down to Rei, huddled at his feet, glaring up at him and making ‘wrap it up’ gestures.

“You should get back to sleep, Mum,” said Aedan, his eyes quickly flicking back to Moira, “I’ll be back soon.”

 _“Don’t worry about me, a thaisce, I’ll be—”_  the image on the screen of Moira suddenly distorted, then she paused and blinked,  _“Did it just—”_ The image distorted again,  _“–for you too?”  
_

“Yeah it’s–” Aedan started and the image distorted.

 _“There’s something wrong–Can you–”_  The image distorted,  _“–you hear me, Aedan? Can you–?”_  the feed cut altogether.

“Something’s wrong,” said Aedan as Rei braced a hand on the monitor’s desk and rose to her feet, apparently swaying from the head rush.

“Easy–” said Aedan.

“So comms are down?” said Rei.

“Comms don’t just ‘go down’ for Talon, and I’m not doing this,” said Aedan, “If we’re under attack, Talon’s going to lock down everything–The airfield, the gates, the—” He stopped himself and took a steadying breath, “It’s okay. This is okay. I can figure this out.” His mouth drew to a thin line, “We can’t stay here,” he said, “We can take advantage of the scrambled comms and still get to a dropship.”

“What if it’s Overwatch?!” Rei’s face lit up.

“Would they know where you are?” said Aedan, “Are you chipped?”

“What, like a dog? Gross! No!” said Rei, putting on the Talon assassin’s helmet and having the red plate come down over her face. The eyes in the visor glinted orange as it activated. “I mean… I’m pretty sure they’d ask me if they did something like that.”

“So we can assume we’re on our own. We don’t know if the attack is on the facility itself or remotely, but either way, we can’t stay here” He handed the assassin’s gauntlets over to Rei.  “Put these on and uh… keep your hands pointed away from your face.”

Rei clicked on the gauntlets, “Why do I need to keep them pointed away from my–” A massive scarlet blade suddenly jutted out of the gauntlet, missing Aedan’s head by inches.

“…that’s why,” said Aedan.

The orange eyes of her faceplate glinted in some surprise.

“They’re retractable,” said Aedan, “Just… touch your thumb to your ring finger–”

Rei complied and the blade shot back in. With that she got the other gauntlet on. 

“Index finger extends, ring finger retracts. All right, now for the really stupid part,” said Aedan, turning back to the monitor.

“I don’t know if I like the sound of the ‘really stupid part,’” said Rei.

“We need a big enough disruption in the facility so that no one will notice a dropship leaving,” said Aedan, clicking through several programs detailing the current status of the nanite amalgams.

_Command: Purge in T minus 15 minutes_

A window popped up on the screen.

_Readings still show Nanite Amalgams not in alternate containment. Override? Y/N_

_Y,_ Aedan typed.

_Enter override code._

_ashes2ashes,_ Aedan typed.

_Accepted._

Aedan heard a snort behind him and gave a slight start how close Rei was to him.

“Ashes2ashes?” Rei said, “You’re all really… ‘None More Goth’ here at Talon, huh?”

Aedan chuckled. “We should get going,” he said, glancing at the counter that had appeared on the monitor, “Fifteen minutes and this place is going to get ugly.”

Aedan opened the door into the hall and looked around. No guards, no labtechs. He put on the labtech mask, goggles, and surgical cap once more, motioned to Rei, and together they headed down the hall. It was odd, seeing someone in full Talon assassin garb walking… like a normal person. Most Talon assassins moved like animals, to him, something alien, between feline, avian, and reptilian. The way Rei carried herself was… well… it was Rei. Their pace was brisk but if they broke out into full-on sprints, they risked drawing more attention to themselves. Rei was still a bit imbalanced from the drugs, able to walk, but looking around vaguely, sometimes her steps meandering away from him, sometimes bumping her shoulder into his, then she’d quickly resume her course as best she could. Aedan could feel his stomach knotting up with stress. They just had to get to Urdr’s airfield, type in the preset coordinates to Reykjavik, say their goodbyes, and that was it. Then  _“Whoops, there was an accident in my lab–what do you mean the ninja girl escaped?”_ and this whole thing could be put behind him.

 _You can’t just do something like this,_ One of the nagging, nattering voices in his head spoke up,  _You can’t just pick and choose what parts of Talon you’re going along with, and what parts you won’t, and you know it. This isn’t taking a joyride with Seye on one of the hover dollies, this is actively undermining–no, betraying, Talon. And for what?_

Aedan looked over at Rei, her face hidden by the assassin’s helmet.

_For what?_

_She’s a weapon. You’re literally handing a weapon right back to Overwatch. You’re going to have to face her one day—the two of you are going to be on opposite sides of a battlefield because you couldn’t do what had to be done tod—_

“Can I ask you something?” said Rei, snapping Aedan out of his thoughts.

“Shoot,” said Aedan with a shrug, thankful there was something to interrupt the train of anxiety.

“What was your mother saying back there—the thing that kind of sounded like sneezing?” asked Rei.

 _Right, she’s still a bit out of it,_  thought Aedan. “What?” said Aedan.

“A-hesh-keh,” said Rei.

“ _A thaisce?_ ” suggested Aedan.

“Yeah, that,” said Rei.

“Oh—“ Aedan reddened a little, “She just… that’s… just what she calls me…” he rubbed the back of his neck.

“Irish, right?” said Rei, “What does it mean?”

Aedan felt his own face burning and then folded his arms, “It… means ‘My treasure,’” he said, figuring there was no use in lying about it.

He expected her to snicker or tease or worse at that, but she didn’t. The eyes of the assassin’s faceplate just gleamed a little. A smile? “Hey,” she said, pointing a thumb at herself, “Sunshine–Well… ‘ _Sunneschii._ ’ You’re not the only one who still has a baby nickname.”

“Of course you’re ‘sunshine,’” said Aedan, quietly, smiling a little beneath the Labtech mask.

 “Moira…She loves you, doesn’t she?” said Rei, “Like…  _actually_  loves you.”

“Wh—Of course she loves me, she’s my mother!” said Aedan, “I mean… sure, I wasn’t…  _born_  like you but…” Aedan didn’t really know how to finish that sentence.

“…so my mom was right,” Rei said quietly, “Moira didn’t have you… she made you.”

Aedan was silent for a few seconds, then straightened his shoulders and forced a grin. “Well of course,” he said, gesturing at himself with a faux-grandiloquence, “Designer.”

Rei looked at him a blankly.

“Designer… genes…” Aedan said a bit weakly.

“Are you… okay?” Rei tilted her head at him.

“Fine, just…” Aedan made a waving gesture next to his head, “Trying to figure things out. I’ve never done anything like this before.”

Rei extended a hand and touched his arm. He looked from her hand, to her. Her expression, naturally, was unreadable with the red faceplate of a Talon assassin, but somehow there was something steady in the orange glint of her visor.

“…Thank you,” she said after a beat, “I… I still don’t know if this is all some sick game on Moira’s end but… if it isn’t… you’re risking a lot. So thank you.”

“Not that your skepticism isn’t fully justified but… what’s it going to take for you to see this  _isn’t_  some sick game on my mum’s end?” said Aedan.

“Getting back to Gibraltar,” said Rei.

“…Fair,” said Aedan, “I’ll do my best to get you there, then.”

The lights suddenly dimmed and an alarm started blaring.

“This is the stupid part of the plan, right?” said Rei, looking at Aedan.

Aedan checked the timer on his comm. “…nnno,” he said slowly, “It’s about 8 minutes too early for the stupid part.”

“Oh…” said Rei, “We’re in trouble, aren’t we?”

“We’ve  _been_  in trouble, but now we’re in more trouble, yes,” said Aedan.


	32. Breach Pt. 5

The office was dark. Even Talon administration had to be dramatic, Gabe supposed. ‘Halldór Magnusson’ was written neatly on a gold nameplate on the desk, which Reaper leaned against as he skeptically swirled a shot glass filled with brennivín. There was a small cabinet of the liquor behind the desk, Gabe assumed for closing deals and kicking off new projects. More ceremonial than anything. Magnusson wasn’t in. Some lab project in a bunker in Albania, last Gabe heard. He shrugged and knocked the shot back then coughed, nanite smoke flaring off of his body at the apparent assault that he now gulped down his throat, before he set the shot glass down on the desk and rubbed his face.

“Sir!” A talon agent burst through the door then instantly winced back at Gabe’s face, only dimly lit in the light from the hallway. Instantly he looked at the ground, “My apologies sir–I should have knocked—”

Reaper grabbed his bone-white mask off of the desk and calmly put it on. “Report,” he said.

“Several guards have gone offline in the west sector, sir,” said the agent, “We sent in a strike team to investigate and…”

“The comms go dark and when you send in backup for the backup, you just find a fresh pile of corpses,” said Reaper.

“Well… not all corpses—A decent number of corpses, but some are just incapacitated, nothing biotics can’t–”

“Overwatch,” Reaper said easily. He sighed wearily. “The kid was tracked.”

“We destroyed the asset’s comm–”

“Stop calling her ‘the asset.’ She’s a kid and you have to live with that,” said Reaper, “We all do.”

“Fine. We destroyed…. the kid’s… comm. If Overwatch had some other means of tracking her, it would have to be something state of the art, black market. Not their usual M.O.”

“Overwatch hasn’t had a ‘usual M.O.’ since the Petras Act,” said Reaper. He sighed and pulled his hellfire shotguns off his hips, “Assemble a fresh strike team,” he said, testing their weight in his hands, “Get a heavy assault agent in the southern sector—cut off their means of escape.”

“Will you… be joining us sir?” the Talon agent said hesitantly.

“I keep telling myself I’m too old to babysit you grunts, and yet you keep proving me wrong,” muttered Reaper, “Get me my strike team. Rendezvous at the northwestern sector.”

“U-understood, sir,” said the Talon agent.

—

The alarms were still blaring as Aedan and Rei hurried down the corridor towards the airfield.

“Do you have to keep doing that?” said Aedan.

Rei was extending her arm, the scarlet blade of the assassin’s gauntlets jutting out and shooting back into her gauntlet as she frowned at them. “Why wrist-mounted?” she muttered, her voice still a little vague from the fog of sedatives she was recovering from, “You need to be able to to let go of a blade if it gets caught in something… wrist-mounted for a blade this size is just  _dumb_ ….”

“It’s assassin armor–it’s meant for quickly dispatching someone and getting out, not an extended fight,” said Aedan.

“My family’s been doing the assassin thing for centuries,” said Rei with a slight scoff, “I think I know what I’m talking about.”

“…so you  _are_  an assassin,” said Aedan, his hand unconsciously brushing against the biotic rig on his opposite wrist, but Rei shook her head.

“No, Dad and Uncle just taught me how to protect myself,” said Rei.

“Being able to tear through several armed Talon guards with nothing but an IV stand is a little more than ‘protecting yourself,’” said Aedan.

“It’s protecting me against Talon, isn’t it?” said Rei.

Aedan opened his mouth for a rebuttal, paused, then closed it at and glanced off.

Rei suddenly seemed alarmed and glanced over at Aedan. “About the ‘pencil-neck’ thing…” she started, “I…” she let the scarlet blade slide back into her gauntlet and folded her arms, “Your mom was right. I wasn’t going to do it. But I’m sorry.”

Aedan couldn’t really read her expression with the faceplate, but she was looking at the floor, her shoulders caving in a little.

“I wasn’t toying with you,” Aedan blurted out.

“What?” said Rei.

“When… I faded. I mean—When my mother said ‘Stop toying with her’ I wasn’t toying with you. Everything happened so fast it didn’t even occur to me that I  _could_  fade. I just thought—”

Aedan’s biofeed picked up a mass of green-highlighted bodies moving through the hall ahead and suddenly he hooked his arm in Rei’s and pulled her off to the side of the hallway, tucked into a doorway where they were just slightly out of sight as a contingent of Talon grunts and enforcers thundered through the halls. 

“The trouble?” said Rei, looking at Aedan.

“Shh,” Aedan brought up a hand and Rei watched the Talon enforcers hurry by.

“Think maybe we should foll–” Rei started but instantly went dead silent at the sound of bootsteps, slower, more sure. A figure all in black swept around the corner and Rei’s breath caught in her throat. Reaper was bringing up the rear of the troop of guards, a lot slower than in his prime, but no less menacing. The black smoke of biotic decay bled off of him. Reaper nearly disappeared around the corner, but then paused. A bone white mask turned and stared down the hall at them both.

 _He knows_ , thought Aedan,  _He knows. He knows. He knows. He knows. He knows and we’re dead. We’re dead. We’re so very, very dead._

Aedan’s heart was pumping hard in his throat and ears. Rei’s fingers were digging tight into his arm as Reaper calmly regarded them. He glanced back at her, he could fear her breath shallow and claustrophobic behind the faceplate.

 _I’m sorry,_ he thought,  _I’m sorry, Rei. I was an idiot to think I could do this. I’m sorry I got your hopes up. It’s over—_

It was then that Reaper broke his sight away from them and continued on after the troop of talon grunts, the smoke still trailing behind him. There were a few seconds of tense silence before Rei exhaled and her death-grip on his arm loosened as she slumped back on the wall behind her.

“That was too close,” she said very softly.

“…that was a lot more than close,” said Aedan.

“What?”

“We should keep moving.”

—

The alarms were blaring and the corridors were dark, but their team had been running missions like this for years. Jack was running mission schematics back on the Orca, with Tracer piloting it to keep it close to the facility for a quick pickup when given the signal. Within the facility, Mercy, Genji, Sombra, D.Va, Lúcio and Hanzo raced through the halls. Sombra and Hanzo were at the head of the pack, with Sombra activating her cloaking, running ahead and disabling security systems and sneaking around the guards when she could, disabling their comms, thinning their numbers, translocating back to the team to keep them updated on Rei’s position.

“Moving—?? Why is she moving!?” said Mercy, “Where are they taking her??”

“Airfield, looks like,” said Sombra.

“They wouldn’t know it’s us this quickly, would they?” said Mercy.

Sombra sighed, “Look, since I defected, I haven’t been able to keep as close tabs on what Talon does and doesn’t know. For the sake of the mission and for Rei’s sake, let’s assume they know and they’re moving her. Which means we need to move as well.” With that she hurled a translocator forward to meet back up with Hanzo.

Mercy gave a glance over to Genji. His movements had smoothed significantly since the mission started, but that could be chalked up to adrenaline. Jack was right, they were emotionally compromised, and she felt the anxiety in every fiber of her muscles, yet at the same time it drove her forward–a fear and a fury that pushed all exhaustion to a mere afterthought as they raced through the corridors of the Talon lab facility.

“Look out!” shouted D.Va, blasting past them as a flood of Talon guards rounded the corner.

“ _Kuso,_ ” muttered Genji under his breath as he drew several shuriken with a flick of his wrist. An enforcer who was closing in on him was suddenly knocked back by a soundwave.

“Follow the signal and keep going forward!” shouted Lúcio, “We’ll catch up!”

Mercy and Genji exchanged glances before sprinting headlong through the fight, behind D.Va, the Meka carving a path for them through the swarm of talon guards before stopping short.

Both Genji and Mercy peeked out on either side of the Meka. A dark figure with a bone-white mask materialized from smoke at the end of the hall. In a heartbeat Genji had his wakizashi drawn.

“Reaper,” Mercy’s voice was hushed.

In a flash of purple, Sombra appeared alongside D.Va and pointed her gun at Reaper.

“Go,” Sombra looked to the others, “Get to Hanzo. I’ll handle him.”

“Are you sure?!” Mercy started.

“No time for sure! Go!” said Sombra. With a wave of her hand, Genji’s visor suddenly flashed purple, facility schematics and Rei’s location showing on the HUD of his visor. Mercy craned her neck over the crowd of Talon agents and just past Reaper where Hanzo was currently stuck in a game of cat and mouse with a Talon sniper. Mercy wrapped her arms around Genji from behind and shoved off the ground with her feet, her Valkyrie wings spreading as both she and Genji shot through the crowd, Mercy barely keeping her grip on Genji as he shot out a fan of shuriken to force Talon agents out of their way.

“Lúcio, D.Va, keep those guards off me! I’ll keep Reaper busy!” Sombra shouted as Mercy and Genji shot off towards Hanzo and out of the thick of the fight. Mercy twisted in mid-air and hurled Genji forward. Genji drew his wakizashi in mid-air and slashed and tackled the sniper before pouncing off of her and rolling to a stop, turning around just in time to see Hanzo finally dispatch the 

In the midst of her flight, Mercy glanced out of the corner of her eye to see Reaper raising a gun toward them, only to be stop when a small object suddenly hit him in the side of the head. Reaper glanced down. He had barely registered the object that hit him as a translocator when Sombra suddenly materialized in a purple flash with a hard kick to the stomach that sent Reaper rocking back several steps.

“We need to talk, Gabe,” said Sombra, holding her SMG up to his mask as the Shimada-Ziegler family took off out of the fight and down the hall.

—-

“Biofeed’s picking up four grunts….” Aedan touched his fingers to his temple and squinted, trying to make out the mass of glowing green shapes through the walls, “Two enforcers, and one Heavy in the hangar. We’re just going to walk right past them so act natural.”

Rei looked down at herself.

“ _Assassin_  natural,” Aedan added, “Like… hunch over more and make your breathing… ragged and… grunty.”

“What’s wrong with your assassins?” Rei asked.

“If we had three hours, I could go into it, but we do not,” said Aedan, opening the door to the hangar.

The group of Talon agents wasn’t in their immediate line of sight as they entered the hangar. The hangar was far less claustrophobic than the halls of the lab facility, but with that openness came a clear feeling of vulnerability. Rei looked around at the various slightly skeletal structures of Dropships and other vehicles either being repaired or cannibalized to repair other ships, and the various crates from different shipments. As the two of them walked out from a pallet of crates, they saw the group of Talon agents. Three of the grunts and one of the enforcers were playing cards, one of the enforcers was polishing his shotgun, the Heavy Assault unit was reading with another grunt leaning over his shoulder. Rei paused, only briefly, staring at the heavy assault unit.

 _Shit, she’s never seen a Talon heavy assault, has she?_  thought Aedan. The size alone was enough to make anyone stare, but Rei managed to catch herself and resumed walking. _Good,_  thought Aedan, as they crossed across the hangar and headed towards a steel door that would lead out to the airfield,  _Just a little bit further—_

“Oi. You got clearance?” a voice cut across the hangar. Rei nearly paused but Aedan kept walking and Rei followed suit.

“HEY!” the voice called after them, “Talking to you, Labtech! You and your assassin dog got clearance?”

“ _‘Dog?’_ ” Rei repeated under her breath but quickly went silent.

Aedan calmly turned on his heel to see the enforcer who had been polishing his shotgun was standing up, “Someone needs to make sure all the dropships are accounted for with the current breach,” Aedan said, “You know…make sure you’re doing your job?”

“…yeah I call bull,” said the enforcer. The Heavy Assault unit alongside him glanced up from his book to look at them.

Aedan and Rei exchanged glances. Aedan could feel himself sweating, he could feel his breath fogging nervously on the inside of his labtech mask.

“Masks off and state your serial numbers,” said the enforcer, cocking his shotgun.

“I–How  _dare you_ ,” said Aedan, “Do you have any idea who I am or whose orders I’m acting o–”

“If I did, taking off the mask wouldn’t be a problem,” said the enforcer, closing the distance between them, shotgun in hand, “But with the comms down, you’ve got no one backing up your word—”

“Comms are down?” Aedan repeated.

“Comms are down,” Rei said softly.

 The enforcer’s head swiveled toward her, “Since when do Assassins use words—?”

Rei lunged forward and punched the enforcer hard in the solarplexus before seizing the barrel of the shotgun and smacking him across his helmet with it before dipping low and using him as a meat shield as the rest of the Talon agents opened fire on them.

“Are you _insane?!”_  Aedan shouted as he leapt behind several steel crates for cover.

“No comms means no backup!” Rei shouted at him, charging forward with the enforcer’s armored boots sparking along the ground with her sprint before she shoved him into one of the grunts, ducked down to avoid the fire of another enforcer’s shotgun, before dipping low again and kicking out the enforcer’s legs from underneath him before throwing him into two of the grunts. “Come on! I can’t do this alone!”

“Oh for—” Aedan started, but he heard the whirring of twin miniguns warming up and then swore under his breath as he dipped out from behind the crates, faded, set his biotic rig to ‘sap’ and tackled one of the grunts from behind, gripping the side of the grunt’s neck and drawing the strength from his body before he slumped to the ground unconscious.

“One down!” shouted Aedan.

“That’s great!” shouted Rei, who currently had her legs wrapped around one grunt’s neck in a choke hold while holding another grunt’s gun pointed toward the ceiling with one arm, and punching him repeatedly with the other.

“Ninjas…” muttered Aedan, before looking to see the Heavy assault agent hauling up his miniguns, “Look out!”

Rei let out a shriek before leaping off of the talon grunt in a graceful backflip, extending the scarlet blades of her assassin gauntlets in mid-air and deflecting the hail of pulsefire that the heavy assault unit was now hammering down upon her. For a moment in mid air she was just a mass of rapidly moving red light and yellow sparks of deflecting pulsefire, but for all the impressiveness of it, she still wasn’t used to the gauntlets. A round caught her in the shoulder and she grunted, hit the ground in a tumble, the sheathing the blades of her gauntlets, and scrambled out of the way of the fire, taking cover behind a dropship frame.

“Shit,” Aedan faded over to her cover to and crouched next to her, she was breathing hard, gripping her shoulder. Aedan set his biotic rig to ‘heal.’ 

“Here, let me—” He extended a hand toward her.

“It’s okay,” she grunted and her breath shuddered a little, “I-I’ve got this—”

“You got shot,” said Aedan.

“I know but—” Rei took a steadying breath, “Hey uh… don’t freak out at what happens next, okay?”

Aedan huffed. “I think I’m well past freaking out at this point,” he said, forcing a smile.

Rei smiled a little too, then closed her eyes. A bright yellow light suddenly flared off of her upper back and massed around her shoulders, shaping itself into something scaly and snakelike that spiraled around her as she rose to her feet. She opened her eyes–no pupils, no deep gray irises, no sclera, just yellow light. She looked at him, the dragon roiling around her, a mass of energy and fury.

“What the _fuck,_ ” was all that escaped Aedan.

“I’ll draw their fire. Flank and subdue them,” said Rei, the dragon coiling around her arms as she unsheathed the red assassin blades of her gauntlets and dove out from behind the dropships frame, tackling one of the talon grunts moving to flank them and slicing his gun in half with an assassin blade before sheathing the blade and knocking him out with a solid dragon-wrapped punch. Two grunts down now. They had more of a chance.

“Oh shit _–_ that’s the asset—” one of the enforcers started as Rei rounded the side of the dropship frame and started sprinting towards them

“My name is _Rei!_ ” Rei’s voice was half-drowned out by a dragon’s roar as she slashed out with the assassin’s blades. _  
_

—

“A kid, Gabe?!” Sombra was shouting, “A goddamn  _kid!?”_

It was all Reaper could do just to go into wraith form and avoid the worst of Sombra’s fire as she chased him down the hall. Every time he tried to return fire she would either translocate and flank him or turn invisble altogether and disappear. Still, he was glad he had called in the heavy assault agent–most of his Talon guards had either retreated to a more easily defensible position or were subdued, without that heavy keeping D.Va and Lúcio busy, the fight would easily be three on one.

“You’re taking this much more personally because of Amélie–” Reaper started.

“Yes! Yes I am! You hated what they did to Amélie just as much as I did!” Sombra kept trying to get a lock on him with her free hand, trying to hack him, to disrupt his nanites so she could take him down. This was the same woman who saw his arm fall off years ago, who had pleaded with Jack Morrison to help him. 

“It wasn’t my decision—” Reaper started.

“You could have stopped it!” Sombra finally got a bead on him as soon as he got out of wraith form, and with a few deft motions of her fingers, his body was a roiling mass of nanites on the fritz and tissue struggling to maintain its structural integrity.

“You think they would have bothered asking me?” said Reaper trying to avoid her fire as best he could, though some pulsefire just whipped through him like water with his body partially decomposing.

“You’re on Akande’s stupid council, _you should know!_ ” snapped Sombra, holding her SMG up to his face.

“Uh–Sombra?” Lúcio called from down the hall. 

“ _What!?_ ” Sombra whirled around on her heel, to see D.Va, Lúcio, and even the Talon heavy assault standing still and staring down the hall. Between D.Va’s Meka and the heavy assault unit, it was hard to tell what they were looking at, but once Sombra ceased firing her gun, a sound in the air became clearer. It was a wet, wretched sucking sound. “…Moira?” Sombra said, recalling the sounds of one of Moira’s spheres of biotic decay.

It was not Moira. There was a mass of black, like a flood of ink, going down the hall, it was like liquid and at the same time not. Sometimes it formed into solid masses and then broke down again as it surged forward—a smoking black flux in a state of perpetual freeze and thaw and life.

“Run,” said Reaper.

“Gabe? What are those?” said Sombra as the mass of amorphous black and purple blobs surged across the floor.

“ _Run!_ ” Reaper snarled, attempting to shadow step but only finding his body giving off excess biotic decay. He took off in a run.

“Hey!” Sombra took off after him, with Lúcio and D.Va racing behind them. Lúcio pivoted on his hard-light skates to get a better look at the amalgams as the Talon heavy assault blasted away at them with his miniguns.

“What  _are_  those things!?” D.Va shouted, hammering away at her Meka’s thrusters.

Lúcio’s eyes widened at the smoke of biotic decay rising off of them, “They look kind of familiar…” he said, watching as the Talon heavy assault blasted away around his feet as black flooded around him, barely keeping the amorphous blobs away, “Kind of remind you of Reaper, right?” he looked over at D.Va. A handlike mass of black ichor flailed out from the aggregation of black and snatched at Lúcio’s heel, “Woah!” He instinctively leapt back and glided along the wall to avoid them.

“I don’t want to look at them any more than I have to,” said D.Va, suddenly shrieking and jerking off to the side as black splashed against the viewport of her meka before thrusting forward again.

“Nanite amalgams. Talon made them to research my condition,” said Reaper.

Sombra stared after him as they both continued to race down the hall. “Talon made  _babies_  of you!? Has this organization gone completely off the rails since Widow and I left!?”

“Do those things _look_  like babies!?” Reaper snapped, “Moira said they’re more like–like coral colonies, except made from my tissue and nanites.”

A horrible yell came down the hall and Sombra looked over her shoulder to see the heavy assault unit previously blasting away at the nanite amalgams now caught up to his waist in black as he desperately fired on the nanite amalgams still flooding down the hall, bellowing in pain.

“Coral colonies don’t do  _that,_  Gabe!” shouted Sombra.

“Just keep running,” said Reaper.

—-

As deadly as Hanzo had proven, getting through the various troops of guards was slowing down the Shimada-Ziegler family more than they’d like. Hanzo was doing his best to thin the various troops of grunts and enforcers that hurried their way, but without Sombra’s SMG, Genji and Mercy found themselves embroiled in short skirmish after short skirmish. A swift strike from Genji took out an enforcer and brought them brief reprieve to keep moving forward, 

Mercy paused to catch her breath in the brief pause in combat, then her head jerked at the sound of gunfire and screaming far down the hall where Sombra was fighting Reaper. For a moment she was torn between maternal instinct and her years of instincts as a combat medic. If the team was in danger she had to get to them, but then she heard a grunt slightly closer to her and her head swiveled to see Genji buckling over, his hand braced against the wall.

“Genji–!” she hurried over to him and switched on her caduceus staff.

“I’m fine,” said Genji, “Just..” he winced, “Just a stitch.”

“You shouldn’t be straining yourself like this after that EMP…” Mercy touched the side of his faceplate as he eased up with the stream of biotics that now issued forth from her staff. Genji brought his hand over hers, holding it to his faceplate.

“I have to make this right… We have to get her back,” he said softly. He seemed to pull himself back to the present and brought his hand to the side of his helmet, his visor flashing purple briefly. “She’s almost to the airfield.”

“So there’s no time to waste,” said Hanzo as Genji pushed off of the wall, he scoweled at the sound of more talon armored boots thundering down the hall, “Ready yourselves. The enemy approaches.”

“Rei doesn’t have time for this! My  _suneschii_ …” Mercy pushed her hair back from her face as she held her caduceus blaster ready, “She must be terrified…”

“Knowing Talon she’s probably not even conscious,” said Hanzo.

—–

In the hangar, Rei was screaming. 

Aedan was also screaming. 

Both were screaming, more out of fury and panic than pain.

 The other six talon agents were unconscious and all was left was the Heavy assault unit. Aedan had somehow managed to fade, leap off some crates and wrap his arms around the heavy’s massive neck guard and was being whipped around, his skinny legs flailing, as the Heavy assault unit fired his one remaining minigun on Rei, who was furiously deflecting but trying not to hit Aedan while doing so. The minigun briefly spun into a cooldown and Rei charged forward, only to be knocked back hard by the Heavy’s massive fist. She flew back, hitting the shipping crates behind her so hard the steel buckled with her impact, the dragon flared around her as she groaned. The faceplate of her assassin’s helmet had cracked.

“Rei!” Aedan shouted and then angrily jammed his hand into the heavy’s neck guard, using his biotic rig to sap as much energy out of the behemoth as he could. The Heavy suddenly brought his free arm up, seized Aedan by the back of his labcoat and yanked him forward, suspending Aedan by the labcoat as he brought his one working minigun back up and held it a few inches from Aedan’s face. Aedan was desperately undoing the front clasps of his labcoat to slip out of it and drop down to the ground, but his fingers fumbled with panic as the minigun started whirring again. The low chuckle escaped the heavy but that was suddenly cut off by the sound of slicing and a bellow of pain from the Heavy and Aedan glanced down to see Rei, brandishing both assassin blades. She had cut deep across the back of the heavy’s legs, and the heavy fell to his knees as Aedan yanked off the capacitator of his biotic rig and jammed both his hands against the heavy’s faceplate. Aedan let out a yell, feeling every nanite in his body breathe and buzz as the black smoke of a biotic grip spiraled up both his arms, flooding him with the Heavy’s life force. The Heavy was still bellowing in pain and trying to bring his minigun back up, only to find Rei had jammed her assassin blade into it and ripped out the belt of pulsefire bullets. The minigun spun uselessly as the Heavy finally dropped Aedan and collapsed forward.

“Look out!” Rei tackled Aedan out of the way of the collapsing heavy and both were panting on the ground next to the heavy’s fallen form. Rei was on top of him, exhausted. The dragon dissolved off of her in a way that reminded Aedan of the way sand and salt sparkled gold in seawater. 

“Thanks,” Aedan was panting, “Thanks for the save… and the… other save…” 

“Ninja,” was all Rei managed to say, and a sputter of out-of-breath chuckles escaped Aedan.

Rei’s muscles were twitching slightly as she braced her hands against the cement floor and pushed off of him, then held a hand out him. He took her hand and she pulled him to upright sitting position. She pulled off the cracked faceplate of the Talon assassin armor, then pulled off the whole helmet, running a hand through her dark hair. “You weren’t so bad yourself back the–” she cut herself off and her eyes widened as she looked at his face.

“What?” said Aedan.

“You’ve uh…” Rei motioned at her face, “You’ve got a little…” She pointed underneath her nose.

Aedan wiped underneath his nose and looked at the back of his hand, where there was a black smudge.

“Uh… under the left eye, too,” said Rei. Aedan felt a wetness beneath his left eye, wiped his cheek, and found more smudges of black on his fingertips.

“…That’s not blood,” said Rei.

“I’m fine, really. It’s just nanite secretions,” said Aedan, “It happens when I absorb excessive amounts of biotic energy.”

“Okay… that’s… kind of gross.”

“It’s sterile,” said Aedan with a shrug, “Sorry… didn’t mean to frighten you.”

Rei just gave an exhausted huff and smiled, “I’ve seen much scarier things than you, Aedan,” said Rei with a smile before standing up and holding a hand out to him.

Aedan took her hand and was rising to his feet when a clear voice with a posh Dublin accent cut across the hangar, “My dear, you haven’t seen anything yet.”

 Aedan and Rei turned toward the source of the voice and at the end of the hangar, a slim figure in black and violet stepped toward them. There was red hair, streaked with white, and the same heterochromatic eyes as Aedan, though one was framed by a silver half-mask. She stood a ways away from them, but even with the distance her height was impressive as she stepped past several of the collapsed Talon guards with a clear look of disappointment on her face.

“Moira…” Rei’s voice was hushed.

“Mum?” said Aedan.

“I believe we need to discuss your recent behavior, Aedan,” said Moira, a violet sphere alighting on her long fingernails with a flick of her wrist.


	33. Breach Pt. 6

“Don’t you wraith-form away from me! I’m talking to you!” Sombra shouted, chasing after Reaper.

“You’re not talking, you’re yelling and shooting at me,” said Reaper.

“IT’S CALLED  _MULTITASKING,_  GABE!” Sombra hollered and hurled a translocator past him, and phased forward, barely outpacing the surging nanite amalgams behind them. Lúcio and D.Va were only just behind them as well. Several blasts from Lúcio’s sonic amplifier phased through Reaper’s wraith form, but Lúcio was forced to pivot, skating backwards and using a soundwave to knock back the tendril of black that clawed out at him and slow the amalgams’ progression down, allowing Reaper to reform briefly.

“How could Talon make  _babies_  of you!?” Sombra wrung her free hand while shooting at Reaper with her SMG, forcing him to wraith form again, she glanced over her shoulder at the surging wave of nanite amalgams. “Babies? Baby?” 

“If you want to ask Moira about all the technical stuff, by all means,” Reaper rasped.

“Why would you let them make something like this!?” said Sombra.

“I don’t know, Sombra,” said Reaper, reforming once more and coughing raggedly, “Maybe I thought it would help my body’s _constant agonizing state of decay and regeneration._ Looks like we’ve got no choice but to scrub this batch, though.”

“Scrub–?” Sombra started but Reaper glanced upward at a ventilation shaft on the ceiling several yards ahead of them, “Oh don’t you dare—”

Reaper shadow-stepped and wraith-formed up into the shaft, disappearing in the vent.

“ _Ay que bastardo hijo de—_ ” Sombra cut her own cursing short and riddled the ceiling with pulsefire as she sprinted under it, knowing even if her bullets could make it through to the shaft, they couldn’t harm Reaper in wraith form, “Dammit…” she muttered as she turned her attention back to sprinting.

“Hey! Hop on!” D.Va shouted as the Meka caught up with her, Lúcio glided along the wall next to them, using the hard-light acceleration field of his sonic amplifier to speed them up. Sombra leapt up and managed to cling to D.Va’s left gun as the mech thrusted forward.

“We need to regroup,” said Sombra, bringing up a purple screen in front of D.Va’s HUD, “I’ve got Doc and the Shimadas’ locations here. Next left!”

“Got it!” said D.Va, reeling around the corner as Lúcio blasted another mass of nanite amalgams back. They followed a path of fallen Talon grunts and enforcers and the odd assassin here and there. Arrows littered the hallway, caduceus blaster rounds and shuriken littered the walls. They knew they were on the right track. Lúcio stuck to the walls but occasionally had to dip and weave through littered talon bodies on the floor, some were only unconscious and groaning, but those groans turned to screams as the nanite amalgams passed over them. 

“Eugh…” Lúcio bit his tongue, as he wall-glided once again, trying not to get nauseous and trying not to think of what the black sludge was actually doing to people. While he was looking back at the amalgams he suddenly felt a sharp pain slice across his forearm and quickly withdrew it. One of Genji’s shurikens littering the walls had snagged him. Nothing too serious, but bleeding a decent enough amount for Lúcio to instinctively crossfade his sonic amplifier’s speed-boost to “heal.” The mass of nanite amalgams suddenly froze and seized, making that same sick sucking sound as one of Moira’s biotic orbs, then surged forward, at Lúcio, forming a great inky maw and screaming.

“WOAH!” Lucio pushed off the wall, knocked the surge back with a soundwave and had the wind knocked out of him as D.Va caught him on the spare gun arm of her mech. 

“Speedboostspeedboostspeedboost–SPEED BOOST, DAMMIT!” D.Va shouted as she thrusted away from the mass of nanite amalgams. Lúcio quickly crossfaded back to acceleration and turned up the volume on the sonic amplifier, sending all three of them speeding forward. They put a slightly more comfortable distance between themselves and the nanite amalgams, but all their systems were still abuzz with adrenaline.

“Okay uh… quick note–Don’t use biotics around these things,” said Lúcio.

“Oh jeez, the Doc!” said D.Va, continuing to charge forward.  Two more hallways and turns later, they saw Mercy, Genji and Hanzo, apparently catching their breath after a skirmish with a bunch of Talon guards. D.Va only slowed but didn’t stop as they pulled up to them.

“We gotta move!” shouted D.Va.

“More reinforcements?” said Genji.

Hanzo fired a sonic arrow down the hallway D.Va, Lúcio had just came through. “I thought we were pretty thorough,” he mumbled.

“Doc, you gotta lose the staff!” said Lúcio.

“Wh–But I  _need_  my staff! What if Rei’s hurt!?” said Mercy, instinctively pulling the staff closer to herself.

“There are these gross reaper baby things after us!” said D.Va.

“Reaper  _what?_ ” said Genji.

Hanzo was squinting down the hallway when suddenly his face dropped and he nocked an arrow as the mass of inky plasma surged around the corner and started flooding down the halls towards them. Mercy’s hand went over her mouth.

“Uh… it’s going to take a bit more than an arrow to stop those things…” said D.Va.

“I’m sure,” said Hanzo, pale blue light spiraling around his arm as he drew his bow back. He kept the bowstring taut, waiting one beat, two beats, as the nanite amalgams surged toward them. The wave of slimy, smoke-like amalgams clawed forward, only about twenty feet away before Hanzo cried out  _“Ryū ga waga teki wo kurau!”_ The twin dragons blazed around the arrow as he fired it, the dragonstrike clearing a path down the hall and leaving only dark stains on the floor in its wake.

“Phew,” Sombra wiped her forehead, “Maybe we should have kept you with  _our_  half of the squad,” she said smiling.

“We would not have been able to clear this path without you distracting Reaper,” said Genji.

“Reaper split pretty much as soon as those goo things showed up,” said Lúcio, “I don’t think they’re supposed to be just… splashing around like this. They were hurting Talon agents too.”

“Perhaps you opened some kind of containment in the lab when hacking this facility?” Genji suggested, looking over at Sombra.

“Don’t look at me! All I had time to do was shut down Talon comms, freeze up some quarantine doors, and knock out most of the lighting,” said Sombra, “And I know Talon too well to try letting loose any of Moira’s nasty little science fair projects.”

“If not you then… internal sabotage?” said Hanzo.

“Maybe it was Rei!” said Mercy, her face lighting up, “Maybe she’s trying to escape!”

Sombra brought up a screen. “Makes sense for why I couldn’t access the camera for the lab she was in before…Well… she’s in the hangar now, but… she’s not moving.”

Mercy paled. “What’s the fastest way to the hangar?” she asked.

“This place is a maze,” muttered Sombra, we can reach her in maybe 10 minutes.”

“She might not  _have_  ten minutes!” said Mercy.

“…so we make a new route,” said D.Va, “You guys better get out of the way,” she said shrugging both Lúcio and Sombra off of her mech’s guns and pointing the guns at the ceiling. The rest of the team backed away from her as she let loose a salvo of micromissiles straight upward.

Several hunks of concrete fell down and D.Va stepped out of the way of it. “They build these facilities tough these days, huh?” she said, holding down both the triggers of her guns and firing away at the now heavily damaged ceiling. There was another slimy sound down the hall.

“Better hurry, D,” said Lúcio, “I don’t think all those things are gone.”

—–

In the hangar, Aedan pulled off the labtech’s mask. “How… how did you find us?”

“Call it maternal instinct,” Moira gave a tap to one of the small black triangles just above her eyebrows.

Aedan’s own fingers traced along the same black triangles on his own forehead, “The biofeed…” he said softly.

 “Mine can always pick up the location of yours. I didn’t want to believe it but…” she let out a weary sigh, “I’m disappointed,  _a thaisce.”_

“Mum—” Aedan started.

“ _Hurt,_  Aedan,” said Moira, walking towards them, “Do you have any idea what you’re doing?”

“I–” Aedan looked back at Rei. Rei stood with her gauntlet blades ready, her eyes flicking back to him, panting, shoulders slumped, clearly exhausted by having already used the dragon and backing towards the steel doors of the hangar. “We can’t do this,” Aedan said, looking back at Moira.

“You’re being manipulated,” said Moira.

“ _Manipulated?!_ ” said Rei.

 “Whatever she’s told you—” Moira went on.

“She didn’t have to tell me anything,” said Aedan. His jaw tightened. “I’m just trying to get her home,” he raised his hand, extending the biotic rig towards Moira, “This is my will,” he said, a slight shake in his voice.

Moira stared at him, processing the hand raised toward her. Rei’s eyes were flicking between them, not sure if she could attack a mother in front of her son… no matter how apparently flexible the title of ‘mother’ seemed.

“Very well,” she said at last, extending a hand towards him, “This is mine.”

Aedan flinched at the sight of her withered hand, a visible shake overtook his arm, and he had to wrap his other hand around his wrist to steady it. Rei stepped up alongside Aedan, blades at the ready. 

“You’re not going to hurt him,” Rei’s voice was dripping with venom.

Moira tsk-tsked. “Just like your mother— So quick to judge and so easily mistaken,” her gaze turned to Aedan and softened, “ _A thaisce,_  you know I could never hurt  _you.”_

Moira raised her other hand and Aedan immediately understood completely what she meant.

“Rei—Run,” he said, “RUN—“

Rei moved to sprint but in an instant they were both caught up in a rush of yellow and violet light as Moira unleashed coalescence on them both. Aedan’s feet slid backward across the cement floor with the force of the beam, and he heard the thud of metal with the force of the blast throwing Rei into the steel doors behind them. The soft chiming sound of biotics had turned to a roar all around him. It was only disorienting for Aedan, but he could hear Rei screaming. He saw the vague shape of her, a shadow struggling to get out of the roaring beam of biotic energy. The world was blurred, terrifying. It wasn’t the first time he had seen coalescence, but being caught up in it? It was almost paralyzing. Almost. Rei’s screams wound down to a whimper and that paralyzing fear seized his entire chest with a sharp pain.

_She’s dying,_  he realized,  _Mum’s killing her. This is Talon. This is her will._

 Suddenly the roar of biotics faded around him and he only saw the beam of violet and yellow rushing right next to his head, slightly angled at the floor now. Finally able to gauge his environment and  _where Moira was,_  Aedan rushed forward, faded, used the momentum of his fade to catch Moira off-guard. He seized Moira’s wrist and shoved her hand upward, the beam of coalescence pounding the ceiling. It was off of Rei at least, but Moira didn’t even fight him as he kept her wrist thrust upward as his heart pounded in his ears. Moira was staring at him, caught off-guard by the tightness of his grip of on her wrist. The coalescence faded and Aedan became aware of the silence that now hung in the hangar. He turned around.

Rei was on the ground, not facing him. She wasn’t moving. Biotic decay rose off of her like smoke. Aedan broke away from Moira and ran over to her.

“It’s done,” Moira said calmly.

“No—“ Aedan fell to his knees, grabbed Rei’s shoulder and turned her on her back. Her eyes were closed, her face was deathly white, violet veins were lining her temples and branching out from her jawline, “No-” Aedan said, “no nonononono—”

“Come away from her, Aedan,” said Moira, rolling her wrist, “We can put all this behind us.”

Aedan brought a hand up behind Rei and propped her up slightly against his leg, her head lolling back. “Rei–” he started, “Come on, you can…” he trailed off. The metal of her assassin armor was cold in his arms. He put two fingers to her neck, waited a beat.

Except there wasn’t a beat.

Aedan’s breaths went short, panicked.

“She’s gone,  _a thaisce,_ ” said Moira, before muttering “What a waste…”

“You… you didn’t have to…” Aedan’s voice was quiet, hollow.

“I’m protecting you,” said Moira, “You’re emotionally compromised, but Talon won’t understand that. Someone needs to take the fall for what you’ve done. It has to be her. It’s your only chance. Now come away from her and we can—”

“No,” said Aedan, his voice hard and flat.

Moira blanched. “Excuse me?”

“No!” Aedan snapped. His eyes met hers and in that moment he never felt more alone in the world. The utter confusion in Moira’s eyes—the questioning as to  _what_  he was. He squeezed Rei’s still form to himself, biting the inside of his lip.

“Don’t tell me you—” Moira’s brow crinkled, “No… you don’t know her. You don’t know the people she associates with. Aedan, I  _told_  you, she’s a weap–”

“She’s not a weapon!” Aedan’s voice seemed to reverberate against the shoulder plates of Rei’s assassin armor as he squeezed her close, “She’s not…” his arms loosened around her and he looked at her face, “She’s not their weapon,” he said softly, before his eyes trailed up to Moira, “No more than I’m yours.” He looked back at the smoke-like biotic decay rising off of Rei. His face felt wet. Crying? Rei’s body slumped in his arms slightly as he brought up a hand to his face to wipe the wetness off his cheeks. Tears, yes, he could feel them running warm from his eyes, but it wasn’t just tears. His palm came away black.

_Nanite secretions,_  he realized, now aware of the slight buzzing of every cell in his body,  _Of course. The coalescence. The life may have been sucked from her, but you’ve just been blasted with pure biotics._

_Her body is a raging cesspool of biotics,_  he remembered his mothers words from the first time he saw her in the facility. He remembered the way the dragon faded off of her.  _The dragon,_  he thought,  _It’s biotics too. Her body can generate the bloody stuff. This is why Talon wanted her._

“Aedan–Aedan come away from the body–It’s not sanitary—” Moira’s voice seemed far away, blanketed in fog as Aedan moved a hand over Rei’s chest.

It was a simple matter, to manifest the biotic energy from her. The smoke rising off of her behaved as if it was a part of him, responding as if it was merely an extension of the biotic rig, forming a sphere of red and black just next to his hand. He pressed a thumb to his wrist to switch the biotic rig to heal, and clawed his fingers around the sphere.  _Please work,_  he thought,  _Please, please, please work._  Faint yellow lights threaded themselves around the sphere, and sank through, the black smoke of biotic decay dissolving, forming what looked like a little flicker of yellow flame. Pure healing biotic energy, linked specifically to Rei. Moira seemed fixed in place, the pragmatist in her knowing she should stop him, but the scientist staring transfixed, trying to make sense of what she was seeing.

_“Fan liomsa, le do thoil,”_  Aedan muttered under his breath before closing his hand around the yellow flame and shoving it down into Rei’s chest. A bright flash of yellow light surged from Rei’s body, she jerked and gasped sharply, the violet veins lining her face fading as she huffed short hyperventilating breaths. “It’s okay!” Aedan said, bringing her up to a more upright seated position, “It’s okay…”

“…Biotic decay conversion…” Moira’s voice was hushed, awed, “I–” she pressed her fingertips to her forehead. She stepped toward them, “In theory it was feasible, but in terms of actual physical  _execution_ —”

“Stay back!” Aedan flailed out a hand toward her, his other arm still supporting Rei, and Moira stopped. Her face scanned his, her own eyes filled with confusion, then her eyebrows raised slightly, “Just… just stay back…”

“So you really are choosing this,” she said, her voice hushed.

Aedan looked down at Rei, still trying to catch her breath.

“They’ll clip your wings, you know,” Moira went on, “They’ll never trust you, never accept you. They’ll never share your vision. They’ll tether you, not for what you have done but for what they fear you might do. You’ll never accomplish with them what you could accomplish with us. I cannot guarantee that they’ll even see you as human.”

“He’s a lot more human than you,” Rei’s voice was breathy, weak, but not lacking in intensity. 

The corners of Moira’s mouth were shaking and her lips were tight as the smoke of biotic decay curled in her withered hand. “You… you  _wretched_  little—”

There was a sick sucking sound and Aedan ducked over Rei, expecting a biotic orb from his mother, but he glanced up to see Moira looking over her shoulder. 

“Aedan…this was your doing too, wasn’t it?” Moira’s voice was quiet. Aedan craned his neck to look around her narrow frame to see a black ink-like substance seeping under the door on the opposite side of the hangar and surging toward them.

“…Is that the stupid part?” said Rei, trying to bring up her assassin blades but finding her arms terribly heavy. She sheathed them as Aedan hooked his arm in hers and pulled her up to a swaying standing position with him.

“Yes,” said Aedan, “That… would be the stupid part.”

“Stupid part?” Moira arched an eyebrow, “It’s brilliant. The amalgams wouldn’t cause lasting damage to the facility, but would be more than enough of a danger to keep its organic inhabitants occupied. Clever boy…” Moira turned on her heel and a yellow sphere alighted on her hand, “But biting off more than you can chew, as usual.” She hurled the yellow sphere forward and the nanite amalgams curled around it, spiking and surging into it hungrily. “I can keep them contained,” she said, easily extending a hand toward the gyre of black and watching it wither as her biotic grasp sucked the life from it, “But you need to leave.” There was a resignation in her voice, falling back on the matter-of-fact, with a certain stiffness to it that betrayed the very emotion it sought to distance itself from.

“Mum….” Aedan’s voice trailed off. 

“Talon will destroy you for what you’ve done if you stay here. You know that,” said Moira, sending out another biotic orb to keep the next wave of amalgams back. Her shoulders slumped only briefly, her back was to them as she kept back the nanite amalgams. “You…. you were my greatest creation, Aedan. Now go.”

In spite of doing her best to frame it in a scientific context, Moira couldn’t rid herself of the vulnerability of that statement. “ _I love you,_ ” soaked every syllable of it. “ _I love you, I will always love you, I will never love anything as I have loved you.”_ Aedan remembered the image of Moira’s withered hand pressed up against the glass of his amnio-tank and he opened his mouth but his breath and his words seemed to be falling away from him. 

Rei touched Aedan’s arm gently and looked at him. The black nanite secretions that streaked down his face were diluted gray by tears. “Come on,” her words were soft. Aedan’s mouth was hanging open slightly, he just closed his mouth and nodded and together they hurried toward the massive doors leading out to the airfield.

“And Rei,” Moira spoke and Rei stopped. Though it was hard to tell with all the drugs Talon had put her on in the past two days, Rei realized it was the first time Moira called her by her name. No “Dears” or “Darlings” or “Wretched girls.” 

“He’s throwing everything away for you. I hope you appreciate that,” said Moira, “If anything happens to him, I  _will_  find you.” _  
_

_“Well if he’s throwing away kidnapping and brainwashing, maybe he’s better off,”_ thought Rei, but she couldn’t seem to force that comeback past her lips. Rei gave a glance over to Moira and a wave of calm seemed to wash over her. Moira looked terrifying, nanite amalgams surging around her, her face drawn with grief and fury and acceptance that possibly the only person who would ever love and understand her was leaving her in the company of the child of her rival. “I understand,” Rei said, her voice steady, before Aedan’s hand curled around hers and they stepped out into the night. Rei didn’t see the black of biotic decay surge off of Moira as the nanite amalgams swarmed around her as they fled from the hangar.

—-

“ _Ryūjin no ken wo kurae!_ ” the dragon flared off of Genji’s sword as he slashed through a new mass of nanite amalgams. Mercy had taken to damage-boosting D.Va as she let loose another salvo of micromissiles, though looking around at the rest of the team with anxiety, knowing that if she set her staff to ‘heal’ that would result in all the nanite amalgams rushing to her. Sombra was firing around at the nanite amalgams as well, and Hanzo, perched atop the Meka, fired off several storm arrows as well, the ceiling buckling beneath the force of their impact.

“Anytime would be nice, D!” said Lúcio, knocking back another section of the black plasma amassing around them.

“Structural integrity readings are at 19%! That’s as good as we’ve got time for! Lúcio! Sound barrier!” shouted D.Va, hammering down on her thrusters and shooting straight upward.

Lúcio’s sonic amplifier slammed on the floor, sending a ripple through the mass of the nanite amalgams and enveloping the team in green light, before he clung to one of the rabbit ears atop the Meka and held a hand out to Sombra, who grabbed hold.. Mercy hooked one arm around Genji and flew after the meka as it flew upward. The pink Meka rammed through the concrete of the ceiling and Mercy and Genji both ducked their heads down as rubble rained down around them. The cool night air seemed to hit them as a second wall outside the stuffiness of the facility. as the six of them landed on the roof and took off running across it.

“Sombra, what are Rei’s coordinates?” asked Genji as they ran towards the roof of the hangar.

“Still in the hangar,” said Sombra, bringing up a screen.

“She’s… been in there an awfully long time, hasn’t she?” said Mercy.

Dread suddenly gripped the organic remains of Genji’s insides. “Hanzo,” he said, running alongside his brother, “The tracker you put in Rei… does it also say her physical status?”

“It’s meant to be untraceable by almost all current technology, so it’s not very sophisticated beyond giving her location,” said Hanzo.

“Would it tell us if she died?” The question slipped out of Genji and Hanzo stopped running.

“Genji–” Mercy’s voice cracked a little.

“No,” said Hanzo, “No, it wouldn’t. It would tell us if it were destroyed, but…”

“She’s not dead,” said Mercy, her grip tightening around her caduceus staff.

“We don’t know how she’ll be when we find her, Angela—” Genji said quietly, “We have to be ready in case—”

“She’s. Not. Dead,” Mercy’s voice was raw.

“Beacon’s on the move!” said Sombra, “She’s moving! She’s on the tarmac!” 

“I’ve got her location on my HUD!” shouted D.Va, rocket-thrusting over the rooftop, “Lúcio! Boost me! We’ll head her off!”

“Got it!” said Lúcio, racing after D.Va. 

—-

The air was cold and damp on the tarmac as Rei caught up with Aedan as he sprinted toward one of the dropships.

“Hey–” Rei started and tripped a little, and Aedan suddenly skidded to a halt on his heels and turned around.

“Are you okay?” he blurted out, pulling on her arm slightly and looking over it, his eyes flicking down her assassin armor with alarm as he stepped around her, “Lightheadedness is to be expected, but the biotics should have prevented any major damage–” 

“I’m fine. I mean, I just passed out, right?” said Rei.

All color drained out of Aedan’s face. “Well…” 

“…right?” said Rei.

“Yes!” Aedan said, clasping Rei’s hands in his, “You just… passed out! That’s all! Spot on!”

Rei’s brow crinkled a little, “Aedan…” she brought her hand up and wiped some of the black and gray staining his cheeks off with her hand.

Aedan ran a hand through his red hair, his already thin face drawn with anxiety. “You…. may have… died… a little.” 

“I  _what!?_ ”

“Just a little!” Aedan said, putting his hands on her shoulders in a reassuring motion.

“A  _little?!_  I  _died!”_ Rei pressed her hands to her face, “Oh god am I all messed up and-and Reap-y looking?!”

“No!” said Aedan, “No you look…” Rei pushed some of her hair back from her face worriedly, revealing a streak of gray and white in her hair at her left temple and Aedan’s eyes flicked to that for a moment, “Grayy–Great! Great. You look great,” he patted her shoulder. 

Rei smiled at Aedan a little bit, then her eyes widened at the biofeed still on his forehead. “You should uh…” she tapped at her forehead, “So your mom can’t track us.”

Aedan’s hand went to his forehead and his fingers traced over the two little metallic triangles on his forehead that formed his biofeed. “Right,” he said quietly. He dug his fingernails underneath them and pried them off, grunting and wincing as he did so. He looked at the two little triangles in his palm with some sadness before dropping them on the concrete of the tarmac and crushing them under his heel. He arched his eyebrows, first both at once, then one at a time, then furrowed them and scrunched his face up.

“What are you doing?” Rei said with a weak snicker in her voice.

“Making sure all the nerves in my face still work. You’re not really supposed to… rip them out like that,” said Aedan.

“Oh–you’re bleeding… let me—” Rei reached forward and touched the bleeding indents on Aedan’s forehead, waited a bit, then furrowed her brow. She withdrew her hand and touched the indents again.

“Something wrong?” said Aedan.

“It should be healing,” said Rei, looking confused. She looked at her hands and she suddenly seemed terrified.

“It’s–it’s probably exhaustion. You’re back from the dead, after all,” Aedan said, “Don’t worry. Biotic rig, remember?” He wiped his own hand across his forehead and in a yellow glow emanating from his palm, the bloody marks all but disappeared.

“Right,” said Rei, still looking at her hands, “Right.”

A cold wind blew through and Aedan was reminded of their situation. “Look,” he said, moving towards the dropship, “We can figure it out on the flight to Gibraltar. We still need to get you home—”

There was a whistling through the air and the dropship closest to them exploded in a salvo of micro-missiles. Aedan screeched and stumbled back and Rei flinched back hard, then squinted her eyes to see a familiar pink shape glide overhead and land atop the flaming wreckage of the dropship. 

“Rei! It’s okay! We’re here!” D.Va’s voice sounded through the Meka’s speakers.

“Wh-what?” Rei’s eyes widened.

“I thought you said you weren’t being track—” Aedan started but was suddenly knocked back several feet by a burst of green light and a warbling blown-out subwoofer sound.

“Get BACK!” shouted Lúcio as he skidded to a stop next to Rei.

“ _Lúcio?!_ ” Rei’s jaw dropped.

“Sorry we’re late, kiddo,” said Lúcio, keeping his sonic amplifier fixed on Aedan, who was groaning on the ground, “But don’t worry, that talon creep’s not going to–”

“Wait–Wait! Aedan’s not with Talon! I mean he was, but he—” Rei started but then a clear voice cut through the night air, sounding even over the crackle and roar of the flamed of the dropship.

“ _Rei!_ ”

 Rei turned her head and was only briefly able to register the bright white shape framed by yellow feathers of light hurtling toward her before it made impact. Mercy all but tackled her in a tight embrace. “Rei–Rei– _Sunneschii_ –” Mercy’s arms around her were so tight it hurt but Rei welcomed it. Everything seemed to hit her at once, the fear she had shoved to the back of her mind that she might never return home, never see her family again, welled up and released all at once like a wave swelling and breaking as Rei felt hot fat tears blurring her vision and sobs closing her throat. She buried her face in her mother’s shoulder and cried hard, Mercy stroking her hair as she did so. “It’s okay,” Mercy said softly, “We’re here. I’m right here.” Rei only managed to pause and catch her breath as she felt a hand on her shoulder and looked to see the glowing green ‘V’ of her father’s visor.

“Dad?” Rei said quietly, her voice half-muted and half-raw by the tightness of her throat from crying.

Genji pressed at the catches at the back of his helmet and clicked off his faceplate with a hiss of steam, revealing a scarred, exhausted, but wearily smiling face with wet shining eyes. He cupped one hand to the side of Rei’s face and kissed her on the side of the forehead. “It’s all right,” he said, wrapping both Mercy and Rei in a tight hug, “We’re going home now.” Rei made a noise that was half nervous laugh, half sob, like everything could fall apart and everything was coming together at the same time and for a brief few beats only focused on trying to feel the warmth of her parents’ bodies through her assassin armor. 

Aedan watched these proceedings with one ear ringing but no lack of awe. He turned on his side, grunting a little with the pain of being thrown off his feet and onto the cement ground so suddenly, and then when he looked at Rei, she was being hugged by both her parents. Mercy was pecking Rei’s face with fussing, teary kisses. They were all crying. Aedan smiled a little.  _Not a weapon,_  he thought. He couldn’t help but think of his own mother, the way she lovingly smoothed his hair, the way her hand rested on his shoulder and she would smile at him and he would feel like the brightest star in the sky. He wondered briefly if he would ever experience what Rei was experiencing now again. He moved to get up but froze at the sound of a bowstring creaking behind him.

“If I were you, I would choose my next words and actions very carefully,” a voice spoke behind him. Aedan glanced over his shoulder to see an arrow nocked and drawn, pointed at his head. Hanzo Shimada’s thick eyebrows raised slightly at the sight of Aedan’s face. Moira’s heterochromia was instantly recognizable in Aedan’s panic-widened eyes.

“The clone from Oasis,” he said, his jaw and his bowstring still tight.

“Uncle–wait!” 

Hanzo broke his glare away from Aedan, slacking the bow slightly but still keeping the arrow nocked, and looked over to Rei, still wrapped up in both Mercy and Genji’s arms.

“He saved me,” said Rei, “He’s on our side.”

“ _What?_ ” said Mercy.

“Him?” Genji looked over at Aedan.

“I—I just… Well I was trying to—” Aedan was falling over his words.

“He got me out of the lab, gave me this armor, and we were… going to steal one of the dropships,” Rei looked over at the flaming wreckage of the dropship, before shaking her head and looking back at her parents, “He has to come with us. They’ll kill him if he stays here.”

“No, that’s not–that doesn’t make sense–Nothing Moira makes could ever—” Mercy was pressing one hand to her forehead, “It has to be a trick. He has to be lying to you—”

“Mom,” said Rei, “You don’t have to trust him, but  _please_  trust me. We can’t leave him here.”

Mercy stared into Rei’s eyes for a few moments before she shut her eyes and her mouth tightened. “Fine,” she said stiffly, before touching the side of Rei’s face, “But only because I trust you.”

“If he tries anything, we drop him out of the Orca,” said Hanzo, flatly.

“Uncle!” Rei addressed him harshly but Aedan was willing to take what he could get at that point.

“So you’re defecting?” Genji looked at Aedan.

Aedan gave one glance back to Urdr, thinking of everything he had known and accepted and loved his whole life, his lab, their apartment back in Oasis and the view of the city. He thought of his rabbit, his music, Seye, but those images were spliced now with the memory of Rei dead in his arms. He looked to Rei, never wanting to feel what he felt back in that hangar again. “Yes,” he said.

Mercy looked at Rei, cupped a hand to the side of Rei’s face and brought her other hand to the side of her own halo biofeed. “Jack,” she said calmly, “Rei is secured. Bring the Orca around.”

“ETA 90 seconds!” Tracer chimed over the comms.

Rei looked at her hands, sincerely hoping the reason she couldn’t heal Aedan’s forehead was because of exhaustion, and that the new horrible hollow feeling inside her was only a residual ghost of all of her stuffed down fear and adrenaline. The orca swept in, its fat-yet-streamlined shape a sight of comfort in and of itself. She had only been at this facility for two days and three nights, but home felt so long ago and so far away. The orca lowered and Mercy pretty much scooped her up and flew her into it as soon as the door was opened and the rest of the team all followed in. Jack gave a skeptical look to Aedan.

“He’s with us,” said Genji. Jack sighed and waved him in.

—

Jack kept his pulse rifle in his lap and didn’t take his eyes off Aedan for the entire flight to Gibraltar. Hanzo too, kept a steely glare on the clone. Lúcio slept with his head in D.Va’s lap, and D.Va, in a semi-asleep semi-awake haze, mindlessly ran the back of her fingers across his locs. Sombra had several screens open, frowning and only occasionally glancing over at him. Tracer piloted the orca in silence, though even she gave an uneasy glance over her shoulder at him from time to time.

_I cannot guarantee that they’ll even see you as human,_ Moira’s voice echoed in his head and he rubbed his forehead. The initial sting of ripping out the biofeed was gone, but there was still a slight ache.

 Aedan sat a bit stiffly, though now that he was finally not running or fighting, he could feel exhaustion in every cell in his body. Across the orca (as far as physically possible from him while still  _being_  on the Orca, Aedan noted), the Shimada-Ziegler family was in a pile–Rei slumped against Mercy, Mercy slumped against Genji. Mercy didn’t seem to care at all that she was more or less sandwiched between two people in armor. Rei and Genji’s eyes were both closed asleep, and Mercy’s eyes were half-lidded, clearly exhausted as well, but staring down at her daughter as she ran her fingers through Rei’s hair. Aedan noticed Mercy’s head twitch with some alarm and then swivel with a glare toward him. 

_She found the streak,_  thought Aedan. He probably would have been more intimidated by Mercy’s glare, but at this point the exhaustion overrode that feeling. He glanced down at Rei, still slumped against Mercy’s collarbone. He watched her chest rising and falling steadily. She was alive. They made it out. He glanced out the window of the orca, watching the clouds rush by in a deep gray-blue light of the early hours of the morning. He leaned his head against the window, closed his eyes, and let his exhaustion swallow him up in darkness.

—

As soon as Sombra was gone from Urdr, Talon comms were easily re-established and Reaper made a full sweep of the facility with an incineration team. The air stunk of burning plasma and kerosene as several Talon agents overseen by Reaper blasted back the remains of the nanite amalgams with flamethrowers. The hangar was one of the final sectors to sweep, and Reaper opened the door only to see any nanite amalgams still remaining in the hangar decaying on the floor in dark stains and smoke. The trails of black stains spiraled across the floor in almost fractal patterns, and Reaper followed these trails with his eyes until they spiraled around a thin figure slumped to her knees, staring into space. Reaper looked back at his incineration team. “O’Deorain has this area secured,” he said “I’ll debrief her. Move on to the western sector.”

The incineration squad saluted and headed off as Reaper walked across the hangar to Moira. He stopped a few feet away from her.

“He’s gone…” Moira was saying softly, “He’s gone…”

“The Shimada kid too?” said Reaper.

Moira nodded.

“Well Akande’s not gonna be happy about this,” said Reaper, folding his arms.

“Gabriel, if you value what sorry, hollow,  _decaying scraps_  of life you have left, you will not be cavalier at a time like this,” said Moira, her voice tensing and coiling like a snake.

“I’m sorry,” said Gabriel.

“Are you?” said Moira, looking over her shoulder at him, “He was more than my son. It’s one thing to have your body bombard itself with oxytocin while a parasite brews in your uterus, it’s another thing entirely to take a part of yourself out and shape it,  _base pair by base pair,_  into something more beautiful and more brilliant than you could ever hope to be. You could never understand. Don’t even begin to pretend to.”

“I’ve lost people too, Moira,” said Gabriel, stepping forward.

“You don’t lose people. You drive them away. You firebomb them.  _You drove him away,”_  her voice creaked on the last sentence as she raked her long nails through her graying red hair with agony, her eyes shining wet.

“…Jack?” said Reaper.

_“Aedan, you absolute bastard!”_ Moira sprung up to her imposing height, “My  _son!_  You told him something. You showed him something. I don’t know what it was but I know you had something to do with it.”

“Why–?”

“Because I know you, Gabe,” said Moira, “I helped make you. Who else but Gabriel Reyes in all his–his,” She thumped the back of her hand against his chest with disgust, “ _Complexities_ , his  _doubts_ , would inflict something like this on someone who has only ever shown him trust and loyalty?” Her voice went strained and her mouth quivered as she brushed her hands down her face, preemptively ridding herself of her tears before they could run down her face, “What did you tell him, Gabriel?”

“…I gave him the footage from Widowmaker’s treatments,” conceded Reaper, “No one told me what was going on with Amélie when it was happening. I thought he should know what was happening to Rei.”

Moira’s shoulders slumped. She seemed to be working very hard to keep her composure, her lips pursed, her eyes shut as she furrowed her brow. Then all at once she let out a half-grunt half-cry and slapped him hard across the face. His bone white mask flew off with the force of the slap and clattered across the cement floor of the hangar.

“ _WHY!?_ ” her voice was half a shriek, then a softer, weaker, broken “Why?”

Gabriel Reyes rubbed at his scarred and worn face, biotic decay trailing off of it  and chunks of it falling away in smoke. Moira stared straight into his red eyes unflinchingly, her own eyes wet and bloodshot and her lips drawn back from gritted teeth.

“Because,” Gabriel said, “You were right. You gave him everything you never had.”


	34. Breach Pt. 7

Aedan hadn’t really seen much of the Watchpoint when he first arrived. He and Rei were both whisked off to the Watchpoint infirmary and after a short physical by an omnic nurse, Jack lead him away from the infirmary and across the watchpoint once more. His own exhaustion had rendered everything dreamlike and he said little. Jack brought him down a set of stairs, and pointed to a small cot in a somewhat bare room. “Get some rest,” he said, “We’ve got a lot of questions for when you wake up.” Aedan all but collapsed into the cot, peeling off the plates and layers of his Talon labtech uniform to the high-necked and long-sleeved black unitard beneath. It wasn’t his bed, but at that point his body didn’t care. Sleep swept over him once more.

He awoke to a soft hum and opened his eyes to a field of blue light.

“Mornin’ sleeping beauty,” a voice spoke and Aedan furrowed his brow, blearily opened his eyes, saw a cowboy through what looked like glowing blue glass, assumed he was dreaming, and closed his eyes again.

The cowboy sighed and stood up and rapped his knuckles on the glowing blue glass, making a ‘ _bwom_ ’ sound of shock absorption. “Hey. Up. Come on, beanpole. Breakfast is getting cold and you got some questions to answer.”

“B-breakfast?” Aedan rubbed at his forehead.

“You vegetarian? Any allergies?”

“No,” Aedan was struggling to sit up but found his body sore all over. All the adrenaline had dulled his awareness of more or less being tossed around like a rag doll by Talon forces.

“Good,” the cowboy hit a small button on the wall, shoebox-sized opening appeared at the base of the glowing blue glass. The cowboy then slid a fork and plate of two sunny side up eggs and… what appeared to be a scone someone threw up on.

“Rein took all the bacon before I could grab some for ya,” said the cowboy, as Aedan skeptically looked over the plate and the opening at the base of the glowing blue glass closed, “Biscuit ‘n gravy should be plenty, though.”

“Is–What is this?” said Aedan looking up from the plate.

“Breakfast,” said the cowboy.

“No, I-I mean,  _this,_  I mean  _you,_ ” Aedan gestured around and then suddenly became very aware that he was encased by the glowing blue glass on all sides, “…this is a cell,” he said quietly.

“It’s just a precaution, and hopefully it’s just temporary,” said the cowboy.

“‘Hopefully?’” repeated Aedan.

“It’s going to depend on you, kid,” said the cowboy, “Thankfully I happen to be an excellent judge of character–”

“Where’s Rei?” Aedan suddenly perked up more, “Is she all right?”

“She’s all right. They’re still running some diagnostics on her. You understand, last time one of our own got kidnapped by Talon and came back, we thought they were all right…. and then….” the cowboy exhaled, “Rei vouched for you, but we can’t take a lot of chances with Talon. Hence your current accommodations. Your food’s getting cold, by the way.”

Aedan cut into the eggs with his fork and sent yellow yolk bleeding across his plate before taking a bite. Although in Aedan’s opinion, gravy had no business being white and having… chunks in it, he found it a comforting, savory flavor. Hunger surged up from his soreness and exhaustion, and for a brief few seconds the cell around him seemed to melt away as he fell into the sensation of having food in his stomach after stress had suppressed his appetite for so long. He heard a slurp and glanced up to see the cowboy calmly sipping a mug of coffee through the glowing blue glass, they made eye contact and once again reality came crashing down around Aedan again and his eating slowed.

“Dosed with sodium pentothal, I take it?” Aedan said between chews.

“Breakfast is sacred, kiddo. Ain’t dosed with anything but love, care, and the legendary Deadlock spice blend.”

Aedan took another sullen bite.

“You’re obviously on edge, so let’s start over and introduce ourselves,” the cowboy pointed a thumb at himself, “Name’s Jesse McCree. Overwatch agent. Also Rei’s uncle.”

“Uncle?” Aedan repeated incredulously.

McCree held up his prosthetic hand and the gold wedding ring on it caught the light for a brief flash. “Uncle,” he confirmed with no lack of smugness, “And you are…?”

“Aedan O'Deorain,” said Aedan.

“O’Deorain, huh? So they weren’t kidding about that. You’re really Moira’s…” McCree trailed off.

“Son,” said Aedan, mopping up some egg yolk and gravy with a chunk of biscuit before eating it.

“Right…” McCree rubbed the back of his neck.

“I mean granted, I wasn’t really born in the…  _traditional_  sense but for all intents and purposes, I’m her son.”

“Never knew your mother to be one for traditions, anyway,” said McCree, leaning back in his seat, “She ever tell you about Blackwatch? About me?”

“Is this the interrogation?” asked Aedan.

“We’re thinking of it more like ‘vetting.’ Getting our bearings on this whole situation,” said McCree, “We used to work together–Your mother, Rei’s dad, Reyes, and me. She never told you about that?”

“She mentioned a cowboy, but I thought she was just exaggerating about having to work with Americans,” said Aedan, taking another bite and shrugging.

McCree snorted. “Figures,” he said, “What else did she tell you?”

“Overwatch was an incompetent military behemoth granted absurd amounts of power by the UN–A man with a hammer who saw everything as a nail—but when they had a chance to really move forward, when she  _gave them the chance_  to move forward… they faltered,” Aedan took a bite of his breakfast and swallowed, “They cut her funding. Called for her resignation. But even then they were too cowardly to really get rid of her, so Blackwatch picked her up. Overwatch still collapsed in the end, though,” he polished off the last bits of biscuit and egg white before saying, “The Overwatch we know now is only a ragtag splinter organization deluded by the propaganda of its predecessor.” 

“Fair assessment,” said McCree, sipping at a mug of coffee, “And yet here you are.”

“Here I am,” Aedan said quietly, setting his plate aside.

“Why is that, exactly?” said McCree.

“I realized Talon is evil and I want to be a hero,” Aedan said flatly.

McCree snorted and nearly spat out his coffee before swallowing hard and grinning. “You got a helluva sense of humor, kid, I’ll give you that,” he said, “Now come on—really, why’re you defecting?”

Aedan was silent.

“It’s okay, we just need to know the truth,” said McCree, “Like your mom always said–’Science will reveal the truth’ or whatever.”

Aedan didn’t make eye contact.

McCree huffed a little and leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “Do you know why they sent me to talk to you?”

“The cowboy thing disorients subjects for better interrogation?” guessed Aedan.

“I  _wanted_  to talk to you. I’ve been in your position before. Sure, it wasn’t in a photon cell, but once upon a time I was about your age, handcuffed to a table, and sitting across from Gabriel Reyes. Where you are is no easy place to be, but how you got there is a helluva better reason than the reason I was there,” McCree took his hat off and itched at his scalp, “I told you—Rei’s my niece, and y’all were damn lucky Jack had me stay back and guard the Watchpoint because if I had been on that mission, I would have burned that goddamn lab to the ground. Ain’t no goddamn Talon sons of bitches gonna mess with my kin and live to see the light of day, I’ll tell you that much,” McCree sat back up, his arms folded tightly across himself. Aedan could tell he was still angry about being told to stay back, but finally McCree sighed, “But… Rei told me you saved her. I guess…. I want to believe her. Even if Moira did make you in a petri dish. So you gotta tell me why you defected.”

“I didn’t  _set out_  to defect,” said Aedan, a little bitterly, “I wouldn’t have even  _had_  to defect if Overwatch hadn’t raised Urdr’s alarms. I just…” he trailed off, “I couldn’t let them…” Aedan ran a hand through his hair with some distress.

“Couldn’t let them…?” McCree lead with the question slightly.

 “They were going to erase her. They were going to wipe out her mind. Everything she felt. They were going to make her destroy everything she loved. Every _one_  she loved. And if they couldn’t do that, then they were going to cut her open. They were going to cut her open over and over and over again and—and….” 

“It’s okay—She’s okay. She’s home now,” said McCree.

Aedan’s fingernails were digging little crescent moons into the skin of his palms, “Mum said she was a weapon we couldn’t afford to give Overwatch, and Reyes said there were things I would have to live with if I was going to be a part of Talon… but we were the ones who were trying to make her a weapon. And I couldn’t live with that.” 

A long pause passed between them. “You like her?” said McCree. 

Aedan flushed. “It’s not about ‘like,’” Aedan said glancing off. 

McCree seemed satisfied with that answer. “You said Reyes told you there were things you had to live with—How is he these days? He still pretty active? He’s getting pretty up there…”

“He’s decrepit, but Talon still respects him. It’s all Mum can do to keep him together. Part of the reason I was created was so—” Aedan caught himself.

“…So they could come up with more ways to help him,” said McCree.

“Well… partially. It was also to prove that you could make a stable embryo with Reaper’s… enhancements,” said Aedan.

“How many more of you are there?” said McCree.

“Only me,” said Aedan, “There were previous… attempts, but once their neural development reached a certain point, they would self destruct.” 

“There’s no others of you? You’re sure about that?” McCree leaned forward.

“Why does everyone always assume clones are made in bulk? Look, as far as I know, there are no other… me’s,” said Aedan, “It… took a significant amount of resources to make me. A lot of people considered my genesis Moira’s vanity project because… well….” he gestured at his face. Aedan looked around the cell, “This cell wasn’t made for me, was it? It was made for Reaper.”

“Smart kid,” said McCree.

“Have to be,” said Aedan. Aedan took a deep breath. “I can tell you what I can, but Talon compartmentalizes, there’s only so much they told me.”

“Figured as such,” said McCree, sipping at his mug, “We both got time though. Let’s start back at the beginning. Tell me about your little ‘rescue.’”

Aedan sighed and slumped against the back wall of the cell.

—-

“You’re supposed to be resting,” Hanzo was standing in the doorway leading out to the roof of the watchpoint infirmary. 

Rei was standing on the roof in mid-morning light, wearing an oversized Overwatch shirt and infirmary scrub pants she had cuffed a few inches above her ankles. She had apparently torn another set of scrubs to scraps for fist wrappings. Her feet were bare and her muscles were shaking with exhaustion, but she maintained one leg high in the air in a position that served as a precursor to an axe kick. 

“I was strapped to a bed and drugged repeatedly. I’ve rested plenty,” she said, striking out first in an axe kick, then sending out a flurry of multiple kicks while leaping and pivoting in the air. Her landing was clumsy, stumbling, only frustrating her more.

“Very well,” Hanzo said, stepping forward and letting the door close behind him, “But your mother will be worried if she can’t find you once she’s done with your tox screens.”

“So tell her where to find me,” said Rei, blocking and pivoting and striking out at the air again.

“You do need to rest, Rei,” said Hanzo.

“I’m fine,” said Rei, stiffly.

“You’re traumatized,” Hanzo spoke simply.

“Shut up,” Rei kept her back to him and blocked an invisible punch with her forearm.

“You’re going to hurt yourself if you keep this up,” said Hanzo.

“Shut  _up!_ ” Rei said, suddenly pivoting on her heel and sending a sweeping kick for the side of his head. Slow enough so he could catch it with a simple block, but audacious enough to try and goad him into a fight.

“You’re not in any shape to spar,” said Hanzo, pushing her foot off.

“The hell I am!” Rei sent out a punch and Hanzo easily caught her fist and released it. Rei just let out a frustrated cry and took an impressively large leap, front-hand springing off of his shoulders and pivoting with a flurry of kicks in mid-air. Acrobatically it was impressive, but still sloppy. Hanzo only had to take a few careful ducks and steps back to avoid the multiple kicks.

“I’m not fighting you, Rei,” said Hanzo.

“You won’t fight me, but you’ll  _track_  me, is that how it is?!” snapped Rei.

“I didn’t activate that tracker until you were kidnapped by Talon,” said Hanzo, “And I’ve since deactivated it.”

“You put it in  _my body_  without telling me!” snapped Rei, going in for several punches which Hanzo dodged and blocked easily. 

“If you had known about it, Talon could have gotten that information out of you and removed it. It wasn’t fair to you, or your mother, or your father, but I decided it was safest if as few people knew about it as possible,” Hanzo’s movements were calm, allowing her to channel her rage into her already exhausted muscles but working so that redirecting her force wouldn’t harm her too much.

Rei just let out a cry and punched for his face, he caught her fist  “It was a blatant violation of your independence and privacy, and for that I apologize,” he said, holding her fist.

Her fist was shaking in his hand. “You think it’s that easy!? You think you can just say sorry and it’s going to be okay!?” she shouted.

Hanzo almost smiled, but it only manifested as a momentary twitch at the corner of his mouth. He let out a slight sigh, “Believe me,” he said, “I’m very aware of the fact that it’s not that easy.” With that, he calmly swept her feet out from under her and sent her harmlessly onto her butt. He extended a hand to her and said “Now come back down to the infirmary.”

Rei looked at his hand and then glanced off. “I don’t want to be in a bed in a lab again…” she said quietly, “I-I can’t do it right now.”

“Understandable, but as things stand, you’re doing the same thing your father did after losing his body. The same thing _I_ did after destroying him,” said Hanzo. 

“Wow. How awful. I had no idea being kidnapped by Talon was just like  _murdering your brother,_ ” said Rei, bitterly dusting her butt off as she got to her feet. She suddenly caught herself. “Oh—“ she looked at his face, “I—I’m—-I didn’t mean—-I’m sorry—“

Hanzo just made a dismissive waving motion. “I understand,” he said.

“No you don’t,” said Rei, folding her arms tight across herself.

“You don’t know how to cope with what’s happened to you, so you’re throwing yourself into your training because it’s the only thing that makes sense. I did the same thing. All the time.”

“It’s–It’s not just that…” Rei’s voice went quiet, “I’m not just… I’m not just trying to stuff it down. I’m not just trying to get away from it or trying to stop it from happening again… I… I’m trying to… I keep hoping…” She was digging her fingernails into the side of her arm.

“Rei…” Hanzo started, “I know what you’re going through. I know—”

“You  _don’t_  know! You don’t  _get_  it! It’s not just Talon! It’s not just being kidnapped! It’s not just waking up strapped down to that table! It’s not just  _dying!_  It’s  _gone!_ ” The word ‘gone’ fell out of Rei and she immediately covered her mouth with her hands as if letting it out into the air made it real somehow. 

“What?” Hanzo’s brow crinkled.

“It’s gone,” Rei’s eyes were wet and she spoke into her cupped hands. Hanzo had to lean close to hear her. “I’ve been trying and trying and  _trying_  to summon it,” her voice was shaking, tight, “But it’s not coming. I can’t–I can’t feel it. It’s gone.” The wet shine in her eyes finally welled up and spilled over as she squeezed her eyes shut, “My dragon is gone.”

Hanzo didn’t know how to respond to that. He just pulled her into a hug and she sobbed against him.

—-

Moira’s eyes were bloodshot. Whether it was from crying or insomnia or alcohol, Reaper couldn’t tell, but she carried herself with that grace that was equal parts grim and prim. The Urdr lab facility was still being heavily investigated. Sombra had created enough of a disrupt through their security footage that any kind of deal Moira had struck with her clone must have been lost. Overwatch’s interference had caused far more casualties than the nanite amalgams, but the amalgams had turned the whole facility into a bloody mess. The current Talon lab facility they walked in now was on the coast of Croatia. This one was… brighter than Urdr. That was a nice change, at least. 

“How are you holding up?” Reaper asked as he walked alongside her.

“If we cannot adapt to change, Gabriel, we die. It’s one of the basics of evolution,” Moira’s voice was half-hollow.

Reaper knew he wasn’t going to get much by offering an ‘if you want to talk about it’ so he instead glanced off.

“So, why did Akande call us here?” asked Reaper, passing by several screens displaying images of artificial bacteriophages attacking nanite cells.

“Akande called  _me_  here. I called you here because… I thought it prudent,” said Moira.

“’Prudent?’” Reaper repeated the word as they got into an elevator together.

“Talon compartmentalizes. You know that much. You know there are things I know that you cannot know so that information cannot be compromised and vice versa,” a passing labtech handed Moira a tablet and she scrolled through it briefly before nodding and handing it off to another labtech. 

“So what haven’t you told me this time?” Reaper said, both weary and wary.

“As you know it… took a lot of time and resources to make Aedan,” said Moira, “He was never created purely for my sake, but when you’re using your own cells to make something–make someone, everyone’s always going to see it as personal,” she brushed a graying bit of hair away from her face, “But once his embryo proved stable, Talon demanded I make a subject that could have more… field applications.”

“So what you’re saying is….”

“I proved I could make a stable living person with our genetic modifications with Aedan,” said Moira, “But Talon didn’t want another scientist,” the elevator dinged and the door opened to an eerily bright white lab with a massive amnio-tank in the center, “Talon wanted a soldier.”

“Moira, what is this?” said Reaper, walking toward the amnio-tank. There was only a vaguely human shape in the tank, all details obscured by the yellow glow of biotics so that the figure was only a dark silhouette in a field of yellow. Thin lines like puppet strings floated upward from the figure as well.

“Of course, I also knew there was only so much I could learn about how to stabilize your condition with Aedan,” Moira went on, walking across the lab and prompting Reaper to follow, “You have the additional factor of the SEP serum in your body, which, following your little spat with Jack Morrison in Zurich all that time ago, was catalyzed into constant war with your nanites.”

“Tell me what this is, Moira,” said Reaper, but Moira only went on.

“If I wanted to synthesize a treatment that could truly stabilize you, I had to figure out what a stable union between the SEP serum and my own modifications would entail,” said Moira, “But… getting pure SEP serum proved… troublesome.”

Reaper suddenly gripped Moira by the lapels of her labcoat, “Answer me, Moira,  _what did you do?!”_

Moira remained completely unfazed by his grip. “Labtech Harlow, would you shut off the biotic field and cut the sedative and Mnemosyne feed, please?” she said, looking over at one of the Talon labtechs.

“You–You want me to stop sedating the subject, ma’am?” the labtech stammered.

Both Moira and Reaper shot a glare at the labtech and the labtech hurried over to a panel and hit a few buttons. The yellow field faded to reveal that the tank was full of a clear liquid. Reaper immediately dropped Moira. There was a young woman in the tank, early to mid-twenties. Medium brown skin, close to Gabe’s own, and dark hair that floated upward. The sides of her head were shaved to accommodate EEG nodes and what appeared to be a modified Mnemosyne needle. The lower half of her face was obscured by a breathing apparatus, and the puppet-string like lines hanging off of her silhouette were revealed to be dozens of electrode needles tucked into her skin. Her muscles twitched the way eyes flick around beneath the lids with REM sleep. 

“You cloned me,” Reaper’s voice was quiet.

“Not cloned. A clone is an exact copy,” said Moira, “I needed a stable sample of the SEP serum, so I couldn’t just use your genes. Genetically, I’d say the more accurate term is that she’s your daughter. Yours and–”

The woman in the tank’s eyes opened and Reaper recognized the steely blue immediately.

“Jack,” he spoke the name softly.

With a slight wave of her arms, the woman in the amnio-tank moved through the liquid she was suspended in, and put her hands against the glass, staring at Gabe. Unthinkingly, Gabe brought up his own hand and put it against the glass, the metal claws of his gauntlets clicking against the smooth surface.

“Though for your own sake, I wouldn’t think of her as your daughter,” Moira warned and Gabe broke his eyes away from the cold blue of the woman’s to look at Moira, “Talon knew the risks that came with my making Aedan,” Moira explained, “They knew being an iconoclast was written into his very being, as it has been written into mine. As such Talon took… a lot more initiative with Subject 19′s development. Her loyalty is to Talon above all else. When I say ‘Daughter,’ Gabriel, I mean it in a purely genetic sense. If ordered to do so, she will kill you. Or me. Without hesitation.”

“Subject 19–You’re calling her a number?” Gabe glanced back at the woman in the tank.

“Again, Talon took far more initiative in her development than Aedan’s. Didn’t want people developing unnecessary attachments to the subject. You’re welcome to come up with something better,” said Moira. 

Reaper kept his hand on the glass. “What is this,” he said softly, “A sick game? You lose your son so you tell me I have a daughter?”

“It’s not a game, Gabriel,” Moira said, putting a reassuring hand on his shoulder, “It’s hope.”

The woman in the tank drew one hand back from the glass and looked at it questioningly, then looked to Gabe.

“It’s hope for you,” said Moira.

The woman balled her hand into a fist and struck it against the glass. A spiderweb of cracks sprung up from the impact point.

“It’s hope for Talon,” Moira gave Gabe’s shoulder a slight squeeze.


	35. Breach Pt. 8 and Epilogue

Mercy sat next to Zenyatta’s bed in the infirmary, tired eyes flicking over her tablet. She felt the weight of Genji’s hands on her shoulders, the pressure of his thumbs working into the soreness of her muscles. She put one hand over Genji’s and leaned back in her seat slightly.

“The tox screens?” Genji spoke softly.

“Clear,” Mercy said quietly, eyes scanning across the tablet, “But–but her hair—the  _marks_ –” Mercy squeezed his hand slightly, “What if Talon–”

The door opened and Mercy’s head jerked up from her tablet to see Rei in the doorway with Hanzo behind her. Rei was looking flushed with slightly bloodshot eyes and messy, sweaty hair.

“Sunneschii–” Mercy got up from her seat and stepped over, stroking Rei’s hair back from her face, “You’re supposed to be resting,” she brushed the back of her hand against Rei’s cheek, “What have you been doing?”

“Processing,” Hanzo said simply. 

Mercy’s eyes flicked from Hanzo to Rei, and Rei just pulled her mother into a somewhat sweaty hug.

“I wanted to be here for Master Zenyatta,” said Rei, breaking out of the hug and looking over at the infirmary bed. “I–Is he okay?”

 On the bed, Zenyatta himself was half a mess of wires flowing out of a metallic shell and plugging into numerous prayer wheel-like servers that lined the walls behind his bed. The wires trailed out of his chest cavity and off of numerous ports in his head now exposed with his scalp plate removed.

“The EMP took a toll on him, but he’s been recovering,” said Genji, “He’s… had to be offline for the past few days though.”

“So he doesn’t know how much time has passed since London…” said Rei.

“His being an Omnic and his connection to the Iris means he’d wake up more aware of where and when he is than a human,” said Genji, “His system diagnostic said he would be rebooting any minute now, though.”

Rei pulled up a chair next to Zenyatta’s bed and perched in it, staring at the 9 little lights on Zenyatta’s forehead and hugging her knees. She gave a glance to an orb of harmony that sat on the beside table next to the infirmary bed and picked it up, running her fingers along the engravings. Hanzo leaned against a wall, arms folded. 

“He got hurt because of me,” Rei said quietly.

“Nothing Talon did was your fault, Rei,” said Genji, “They wanted to use the memorial to make a statement and take you, and that’s what they did. You didn’t do anything to provoke that.” 

“You’re a part of this family, Rei–that means we’ll do everything in our power to protect you,” Mercy reached forward and gave Zenyatta’s hand a slight squeeze, “All of us.”

The orb of harmony in Rei’s hand started glowing gold and slipped from her grip, floating in the air. Several other orbs littered around the room lit up as well and all floated upward and gathered in a circle over Zenyatta’s infirmary bed. The wires detached themselves from the prayer-wheel like servers and receded into his chest cavity, the plating clicking shut behind them. The nine lights in Zenyatta’s forehead flickered on and there was a chiming sound of his systems booting up. 

“Master–” Genji pushed in next to Mercy and Zenyatta put a hand on his shoulder, “It’s us–You’re safe–Are you–?”

“My system and memory are fully recovered—save for the time I was offline,” said Zenyatta. His eyes scanned across all of them. “I’m glad to see everyone made it back from London safely.” 

Rei was hugging her knees in her seat again and Zenyatta studied her. “…you didn’t… did you?” he said after a few beats. 

“Talon took her. We got her back,” said Hanzo. 

“I cannot imagine what you must have gone through,” Zenyatta said, sitting up in his infirmary bed and his orbs of harmony settling in a gently floating circle about his shoulders.

“I… I’m fine,” Rei said quietly, “I was drugged a lot of the time. I don’t remember a lot…”

“You fell into darkness,” Zenyatta said quietly and Rei’s eyes widened. Rei looked at Mercy and Mercy seemed to tense up, not shocked, so much as the reality of her own observations finally sinking in. 

“Yeah. I…uh I kind of… died,” said Rei, hugging herself, “But–Aedan saved me.”

“Who?” said Zenyatta.

“Some sick project of Moira’s–” Mercy started and then caught herself, feeling Rei’s eyes on her, “Rei was… able to convince him to join our side.” 

“As anyone would expect of your daughter,” said Zenyatta.

Mercy blinked, caught offguard slightly by the comment. 

“You have a tendency to bring out the best in people,” said Zenyatta.

“I didn’t really convince him–I was just trying to escape but they caught me again, and then… he helped me,” said Rei.

“Interesting…” said Zenyatta, “I should like to hear the whole story, but if you need time to distance yourself from it–”

Rei shook her head. “I…I’m still working through it too,” said Rei, “I’ll tell you everything I can.” 

—

“Wait—Back up—back up— back up. She  _died?!_ ” McCree was pacing back and forth in front of Aedan’s cell, running his fingers through his hair, trying to get ahold of himself.

“Not like— _Died_ -died,” said Aedan, shrinking a little where he sat, “Like, ‘Drowned-in-freezing-waters’ died. Totally revivable. Probably even possible with a run of the mill defibrillator and no biotics but—”

“Jesus Goddamn Christ…” McCree was rubbing his forehead.  

“I–I brought her back….” Aedan said sheepishly.

“You don’t  _tell_  someone you’re rescuin’ them and then let them—” McCree glanced over at Aedan’s face and noticed the distress in Aedan’s expression and stopped himself.

“I didn’t know Mum was tracking me through the biofeed…” said Aedan. His mouth tightened slightly. “Rei didn’t know  _her_  family was tracking her either.” 

McCree huffed and plopped down into the chair again, hat in hand. “So your mom sees you bring her back to life–what then?”

“Well the nanite amalgams reached us by then and… she told me to go,” said Aedan.

“She let you go?” McCree sat up.

“Yes,” said Aedan.

“Moira,” McCree emphasized the name as if Aedan didn’t know what he was talking about, “ _Moira_  let you go.” 

“She didn’t want Talon to destroy me,” said Aedan, “She’s still my mother.”

“And how do you know this isn’t part of some longer plan of hers?” said McCree.

Aedan was running his thumb over his knuckles, remembering the image of his mother’s withered hand pressed against the glass of his amnio-tank, then that same withered hand wrapped around his own.

_“The future I can’t wait to see is the one you build. And who knows, maybe your will will differ from mine. I accept that possibility. Embrace it, even.”_

He remembered the sight of Moira’s back as nanite amalgams swarmed around her.

_“You were my greatest creation, Aedan. Now go.”_

“I don’t know for sure,” said Aedan, “But I destroyed the biofeed. I think…” he looked at his own hand, “I think she wants to see what I do with this. What I become. I’m her son, but I’m also…” he trailed off.

In an instant, McCree knew the word Aedan couldn’t bring himself to say: _An experiment._

“Shit’s always gotta be complicated with her, ain’t it?” said McCree, leaning back in his seat.

Aedan smiled a bit, “You weren’t the one in a petri dish,” he said, easing up where he sat. 

“Okay so… Rei’s alive, Moira’s fighting the… goo? Then what?” 

“Nanite amalgams. Yes…After that we made it out to the tarmac and… well from there we met up with everyone. Rei spoke up on my behalf and now I’m here.” 

“Welp–” McCree stood up and stretched a little bit, “Hell of a story, kid.” 

“And let me guess–you don’t believe a word of it?” Aedan tilted his head.

“I told you I was a good judge of character, didn’t I?” said McCree, “I’ll need to re-confirm with Rei on a lot of the details, and you’re going to be on a probationary period for a while, so… get used to everyone breathing down your neck. But… we’ll get you a nicer sleeping spot, set up a time table for who’s watching you when, and… probably get you some clothes.”

Aedan glanced awkwardly down at the black long-sleeved unitard he had been wearing underneath his Labtech coat and armor. 

“So…” McCree walked up to the panel next to the cell, “You up for a little sunlight?” 

“Yes,” said Aedan. 

“And you’re not going to kill me as soon as I shut down this photon field?” said McCree.

“No,” said Aedan.

“Good answer,” said McCree, hitting a button on the panel. 

The blue walls surrounding Aedan dematerialized and Aedan stood up and looked around as McCree walked over to a locker and rifled through it. 

“…Just like that?” said Aedan.

“Again, probationary period,” said McCree, pulling out a massively baggy gray shirt and tossing it over to Aedan. Aedan held the shirt at arm’s length to see it was emblazoned with a just-as-massive Overwatch insignia. “Get that on. I’ll show you around,” said McCree, walking over to the stairs. He paused at the bottom of the stairs, “Oh and uh, welcome to Gibraltar.”

Aedan hastily pulled the shirt on and hurried after him.

—

“So I’m here now,” Rei was saying, sitting on the edge of Zenyatta’s bed and turning an orb of harmony over in her hands, “I’m alive but…”

“But you lost something down there in the dark,” said Zenyatta. 

Rei broke her sight from the sphere and looked at him. She ran a hand through her thick dark hair. 

“The dragon,” said Rei, quietly.

Genji visibly startled at the word, then looked to Hanzo, who remained leaning against the wall, silent and grim.

“I haven’t been able to summon it since I got brought back,” said Rei.

“That doesn’t mean it’s gone—” Genji started, quickly, putting his hands on Rei’s shoulders, “The dragon doesn’t just  _leave._ ”

“Her dragon was at least partially composed of biotic energy,” said Mercy, “If Coalescence sapped every bit of it from your body….”

“I’m sorry,” Rei’s voice was very small.

“Rei it wasn’t your fault—” Mercy started.

“But she got brought back!” said Genji, breaking away from Rei and pacing, “She could—We could—I—” He looked at Rei. “We’ll get it back. Rei, I promise you, we’ll find a way to get it back.”

Zenyatta touched a cool metal hand to her shoulder, “We all lose pieces of ourselves, Rei. When we know pain, when we know fear, when we know grief—It is all we can do to face what remains of ourselves and keep moving forward. These parts of us we lose… they return to us, eventually… but they are never the same, and neither are we.”

“What if I can never summon it again?” Rei hugged herself a little.

“You will—” Genji started.

“Then you never summon it again. You are not your dragon,” said Zenyatta.

“I’m a  _Shimada,_ ” Rei’s voice was raw, half-choked by stuffed down crying.

“And in the end, you decide what that means,” said Zenyatta.

—

##  **Epilogue**

A week passed on the Watchpoint. 

Rei never stopped trying to summon the dragon. She meditated, painstakingly questioned Hanzo and Genji on the history of the Shimada clan, and trained her heart out, using the dragon as a focal point to drive off the nightmares of Urdr. There was a rotating group of different members of Overwatch and her own peers checking in on her. Rajeev declared them both members of the “Got-Our-Ass-Handed-To-Us-By-Talon” club, and Samir and Marti were more than willing to lend an ear to Rei processing everything that had happened.

McCree was not the last person to interrogate Aedan. There was Morrison after that, and Ana, and Morrison again, and a lot of questions about Reaper and his mother, and then he made the mistake of briefly mentioning Seye which lead to even more questions about Doomfist that he had no way of knowing the answers to. That was four days. Then there was being showed around the Watchpoint, being handed various low-risk menial tasks for him for Watchpoint upkeep, that was another day. Aedan was happy to be out of the photon cell, at least, but it was exhausting. Everyone gave him a wide berth, except those assigned to keep an eye on him. Aedan ended up doing more cleaning and answering more questions in that one week than he had done in his whole life with Talon and back in Oasis. First there was his new residence, the windowless dormitory beneath the hangar, which had collected a lot of dust as most of the watchpoint residents had opted for administrative apartments rather than the dormitory (not that Aedan could blame them.)  It wasn’t the drudgery itself that was hard so much as having to do it without music. First there was rendering the shower area actually useable again. 

“You’re welcome to help, you know,” said Aedan, scrubbing the tile of the walls as Hanzo watched. Hanzo just kept a steady glare on him.

That proved to be about a day of work in and of itself. Then there was rendering the dormitory a bit more livable. Orisa actually proved very helpful, allowing him to clamber on top of her to change lightbulbs and dust hard-to-reach areas of the dormitory.

“Thank you,” Aedan said, clambering down from the massive omnic.

“You are welcome,” said Orisa, brightly, “Also I must remind you that the safety of this Watchpoint is my primary objective, and should you harm anyone, I will subdue you.”

“Yes… you’ve… been reminding me of that,” said Aedan, grabbing a broom and sweeping fallen dust from the floor.

“How’s the babysitting coming along, Orisa?”

Aedan’s head jerked up from his sweeping and swiveled toward the stairs which lead down to the dormitory. Rei was standing there, casually dressed in leggings and a loose shirt, looking tired, but a lot better he last saw her. 

“Commander Morrison has stated that the threat level for Guest O’Deorain is considerably greater than that of a baby,” said Orisa.

“Oh I’m sure,” said Rei, walking over to Aedan, “Hey,” she said with a slight smile.

“…Hey,” Aedan said, his grip tightening on the broom slightly. His eyes flicked to the streak of gray in her hair and he glanced off, avoiding eye contact.

“I can take over from here, Orisa,” said Rei.

“Understood,” said Orisa, walking towards the stairs, “I will resume my perimeter checks. Please alert me if he attacks you.”

“I will,” said Rei, as the four legs of the omnic thundered up the steps. She looked at Aedan, “So… how’s the… settling in?”

Aedan became starkly aware of how silly he must have looked at this point. The clothes Overwatch could provide him were a combination of old bits of uniforms still left on the Watchpoint and awkwardly fitting hand-me downs from different members and as such he found himself wearing a fitted gray and orange shirt from the training facility, and an absurdly large pair of jeans from Zarya which he had to both peg at the cuffs and cinch high around his waist with a worn-out and also too-large belt from McCree. 

“…I don’t recall you being on my overseer list,” said Aedan, reddening slightly.

“I bribed Hammond,” said Rei, “Figured you could… use a break.”

“Hammond—They were going to have a  _hamster_  watch me?” said Aedan.

“Well the gorilla’s too busy,” said Rei with a shrug, she turned on her heel, “Come on, walk with me.”

Aedan leaned the broom against the wall and followed after her as she headed up the stairs from the dormitory and exited the hangar.

“Sorry I couldn’t get to you sooner,” said Rei as they passed into the orange-tinged sunlight of late day, “Everyone’s been… kind of smothering me and… there’s been other stuff.”

“I heard about what happened,” Aedan said quietly, “With the…” he trailed off

“Dragon,” said Rei.

“I’m sorry,” said Aedan.

“Why?” said Rei.

“I was the one who brought you back,” said Aedan, running a hand through his red hair with some distress, “I–I must have messed it up somehow… I’d never done it before, I was panicking—”

“Aedan–” Rei touched his arm, “It’s fine. It’s not your fault.”

Aedan looked off again. He didn’t believe her, she knew he didn’t believe her, but neither had the energy to argue about it. “I’ll fix it,” he said, frowning.

“You’ll fix it?” Rei arched an eyebrow.

“I’m a scientist,” Aedan said, a bit stiffly, “I’ll… I’ll figure something out.”

“You don’t have to do that—” Rei started.

“I have to try,” said Aedan as they headed up the crest of a hill to a boulder-lined cliff overlooking the sea,

“Master Zenyatta thinks I should go to Nepal for a while… see if that helps…” said Rei, clambering up onto one of the boulders. 

Aedan climbed up next to her. “Do you think it’ll help?” he asked.

“I hope it does,” Rei said quietly, “I just…” she trailed off.

“Just…?” Aedan leaned a bit closer.

“I had a girlfriend,” said Rei.

“Oh,” Aedan scooched a bit off to give her space.

“I mean—we’re not—this was back when I was sixteen and I um—I also like–I like guys too—I mean—” Rei reddened and looked down, “I mean…” she sighed, “…two years ago I fought Doomfist. Except it wasn’t even a fight. I wasn’t anything to him. I wasn’t a threat at all. But… after that fight, Jaz and I broke up. We were already kind of… drifting apart, but I realized… I was never going to be normal. Nothing in my life was ever going to be normal. And it wasn’t fair of me to put that on someone else. But now…”

“Do you want to be normal?” Aedan asked quietly.

“I don’t know… I don’t think I ever really saw it as an option before,” said Rei, “I don’t want to give up on the dragon because it’s a part of me, so I’m going to keep trying but…everyone in my family has been fighting so long… maybe this is a chance for me to do something new. Figure out what ‘Normal’ looks like for me.”

“For what it’s worth, you’ll never be normal to me,” said Aedan, smiling. He caught himself, “Which I mean in a good way.”

“Yeah I caught that,” said Rei, smiling.

Both sat in silence for a while and watched a freighter sluggishly drift across the water.

“What about you?” said Rei. 

“Well… conditions surrounding my birth and legal status were always murky,” said Aedan, shrugging, “I could only navigate Oasis as freely as I did because Mum was a minister and she could pull the strings that allowed me to do so. In a sense if I was ever going to leave Talon, Overwatch would really be the only place I could be able to go. Like Hammond, or Winston.”

“Are you going to fight Talon?” asked Rei.

“I don’t know yet,” said Aedan, “But… I’m good in a lab, and I know my way around a biotic rig so… I don’t think I’m completely useless.” He read the concerned expression on Rei’s face and smiled a little, “I think we’re in the same boat, Rei Shimada. This is when I can figure things out, too.” 

“We’ll let each other know when we do, right?” said Rei.

“It’s a promise,” said Aedan. 

Rei smiled and leaned her head on his shoulder and Aedan felt himself relax a little. They sat in a comfortable silence, watching the water and the reddening late-day light. Rei mindlessly hummed a little and it took Aedan only a few seconds to recognize the song.

_Who can I be now you found me?_


	36. It Could Be Worse

“So you’re not even going to consider the possibility?” said Genji, his knife clacking across the cutting board.

“I–It’s ridiculous,” said Mercy, pacing back and forth with her tablet, clearing out her inbox, “I know my daughter. She wouldn’t—Rei has  _taste_ and good judgment.”

“Well… yes but… dangerous situations… emotions running high…” Genji shrugged, “Things… happen.”

“Nothing happened. I asked McCree about it and he confirmed that nothing happened,” said Mercy, “The clo–” she caught herself, “Aedan even went so far as to say that ‘like’ didn’t have anything to do with it. So there.”

“…if you don’t even consider it a possibility… why would you feel the need to ask McCree about it?” said Genji, grinning slyly and waving a half-chopped daikon radish in her direction. 

Mercy blanched. “I–” she started, “I have just as much a right, if not more so than anyone on this watchpoint, to be debriefed on that interrogation.”

“Of course,” said Genji as he resumed chopping the daikon.

“You don’t believe me,” said Mercy, her brow furrowing.

“I believe you know our daughter, and I believe you do have a right to know what was said in that interrogation,” said Genji, rinsing off the knife and moving on to slicing mushrooms, “But I know Rei as well and… I know what I was like at her age.”

Mercy went from white to red. “What—?”

“I’m sure it’s nothing like  _that_ —” said Genji.

“It had better not be!” Mercy blustered. 

“You weren’t like this with Jaz…” said Genji.

“Jaz wasn’t made in a lab by one of the worst violators of bioethics in the world!” said Mercy, now pacing back and forth again, “How are you so  _calm_  about this!?”

“There’s a ‘this’ now? I thought that there was nothing going on,” said Genji.

Mercy set her tablet down and massaged her temples. “You’re being facetious,” she said with a sigh.

“Angela,” Genji scraped the contents of the cutting board into a roasting pan and cracked salt and black pepper over it, “I worry about Rei too. But I trust her. And I think with everything that’s happened—if there’s anything going on— she has a right to… take some relief where she can find it.”

Mercy just huffed and leaned against the kitchen counter, 

“And,” Genji grabbed a raw chicken from the bag where it was marinating and set it atop the bed of daikon and mushrooms, “If we’re being honest here, by Petras Act standards,” he set the tray in the oven and closed it, “There is plenty of legal precedent that  _I_  was created by some of the worst violators of bioethics in the world.” He calmly rinsed his hands.

Mercy’s brow crinkled and she pushed her hair back from her face, “Genji–No, that’s–that’s different. They’re not–”

“Not Moira?” Genji looked over his shoulder at her, a slight wry smile on his face.

Mercy pursed her lips and folded her arms.

“It’s not what they make you, it’s what you choose to do with yourself,” said Genji.

“Another pearl of wisdom from Zenyatta?” said Mercy, tilting her head as Genji rounded the kitchen counter and walked up to her, gently wrapping his arms around her waist. 

“To my credit I paraphrased, but yes,” said Genji, kissing her on the corner of her jaw. 

“Mm…” Mercy draped her arms around his shoulders, still a bit sullen, and slumped some of her weight against him.

“It could be worse,” said Genji, wrapping his arms tighter around her, “He could have knives on the back of his legs.”

“Genji!” Mercy half-huffed and half-laughed. rocking a bit on her heels as she attempted to negotiate between his embrace and her being slumped against him, “That’s terrible!”

“That,” he kissed her collarbone, sending her sputtering into giggles, “Proves it then,” he kissed the point where her neck met her shoulder, “She is your daughter,” he kissed the side of her neck, “And you both have,” he kissed the corner of her mouth, “Terrible taste.”

Mercy scoffed, “I’ll show you terrible taste,” she said, interlacing her fingers behind his head and pulling him into a kiss.

The apartment door opened then.

“ _Tadaima_ –Woah—” Rei was bracing a hand on the doorway and toeing out of her shoes when she glanced up to see her parents wrapped up in each others’ arms. “Uh… I can… come back later if you two need…” Rei trailed off.

“Oh–Um,” Mercy only partially broke out of the embrace and stood with Genji’s arm still around her hips, “It’s fine we were just… getting dinner on.” 

“Oookay,” said Rei, setting her shoes aside and pulling her jacket off and hanging it up. She paused and glanced over at them. “Is… there a reason you’re looking at me like that?”

“Like what?” Mercy and Genji said at the same time.

A long and awkward pause passed between all three of them. 

“I’m just gonna…” Rei pointed down the hall to her own room.

“Right! Right–We’ll let you know when dinner’s ready!” said Mercy as Rei headed down the hall to her room and closed the door behind her. Within about a minute music could be heard muffled through the door.

“Never heard her listen to this kind of music before,”  murmured Mercy, craning her neck to listen down the hall. 

She glanced back at Genji.

“There’s a  _possibility,_ ” she conceded, stiffly.

“There’s a lot more than a possibility,” said Genji.


	37. Family Scars

Mercy was carrying a load of laundry as she passed by Rei’s room, the door was slightly ajar but ever since the whole incident Mercy found her steps slowing at that point in the hall, her head turning just to make sure she was in there. She was in there, her back to the door, standing sideways at the mirror of her closet. She was lifting up the bottom of her shirt, looking at her ribs in the mirror and the dark purple streaks that now clawed over them. Rei traced the fingers of her spare hand over the marks. Remnants of the biotic grasp. A visual reminder, along with the streak of gray at her temple, of what Moira had done to her. Rei’s head suddenly jerked up and looked over her shoulder sharply at Mercy.

“Mom–!” Rei started a bit angrily, dropping the bottom of her shirt and covering up the marks again.

“Sorry,” Mercy started, looking away, she nearly moved to continue walking down the hall but then paused, “Do they hurt?” she asked.

“No,” Rei said, tracing her hand over her side again, “I guess I hoped they were bruises…something from the assassin armor… that they’d fade by now or something…”

“I’m glad your father and Uncle taught you to protect yourself, but I hoped I’d never see you with battle scars either,” said Mercy, put the laundry basket on her hip then reached forward and tucked some of Rei’s hair back behind her ear, “We keep saying this was never your fight but this… Rajeev’s eye… We owe you better. We owe you safety.”

“They’re not battle scars–” Rei broke away from Mercy’s touch, “Reinhardt and Zarya–they have battle scars–That’s stuff with stories you want to tell–This–” Rei’s hand went to the gray streak in her hair, “This was me running around, loopy from drugs, terrified I was secretly going to kill everything I loved while I was getting rescued…” her hand went to her side again, in a motion of hugging herself, “I don’t want to carry that place with me. I don’t want to think of that place every time I’m getting dressed or trying on a swimsuit or–or–”

“You won’t,” said Mercy, “It’s raw now–It’s going to be scary for a long time, but it’s not going to feel this way forever. You need to be patient with yourself. Let yourself feel things Let yourself heal.”

Rei’s mouth was tight, and she was still looking down.

“Here,” Mercy set her laundry basket down and then lifted up the bottom of her own shirt, showing her stomach. There was a spattering of dark lines, like a pointillist image of a sun, almost, spreading out from her solarplexus and stretching over her stomach. Rei had seen these marks on her mother all her life, but it hadn’t really occurred to her that they were scars. She had assumed maybe stretch marks or a birth mark. “They’re a little stretched out from when I had you, but I got these scars from a shotgun blast in Volskaya. I was terrified for my life back then too. I didn’t feel like a hero, either. I was just… scared. But now when I look at it, I feel so grateful that I survived it. That I made it this far–that I got to see you.” Mercy smiled at Rei. 

“If we’re doing a family scar-comparing session, I think I win,” Genji’s voice chimed in from the door to Rei’s room and Mercy gave a hard start, dropping her shirt and re-covering her own scars.

“Give me a heart attack, why don’t you!” said Mercy, turning on her heel.

“Ninja,” Genji and Rei said at the same time.

“Everything all right in here?” said Genji, leaning his shoulder on the doorway.

Mercy looked to Rei and Rei fidgeted with her hair a bit. “Doing better,” said Rei.

“You know we’re here for you, right? If you need anything–” Genji started.

“I know,” said Rei, smiling a little, “…so how long are you two going to be like this?”

“Forever,” said Mercy and Genji at the same time.

Rei snorted and rolled her eyes.


	38. Subject 19

“You may refer to me as Subject 19,” said Subject 19.

“Yeah I’m not going to do that,” said Reaper.

“But that is my designation,” said Subject 19.

“Believe me. You don’t want to stick with a number for a name,” his voice dropped to a mutter, “Being Soldier 24 was bullshit…”

“So will you give me a new callsign, sir?” said Subject 19.

“Look, names are a big deal, you should probably pick one for yoursel–”

“I prefer a callsign that is to your standards, sir,” said Subject 19, “Faster than trial and error.”

Reaper studied her face for a few seconds. God, she really did have Jack’s eyes. Her jaw tightened and a name fell out of him.

“…Andrea,” he said.

“Andrea? Is that my callsign?” said Subject 19.

“Name. It’s your name. We’ll worry about callsigns later,” said Reaper.

“May I ask why Andrea, sir?” said Andrea.

“Do you not like it?” said Reaper.

“I have no opinions on it. Part of my reason for existence is assisting you. I should probably understand your reasoning for seemingly arbitrary decisions.”

“Had a cousin named Andrea. Could kick my ass. Thought it was a good name,” said Reaper.

“I’m glad the name was picked in context of confidence of my abilities, sir,” said Andrea.

“…You’re welcome?” said Reaper.

“Mm,” Andrea gave a single nod before turning her attention back out the window at the lab courtyard.

“…so you know you’re technically Jack’s too, right?” said Reaper.

“They used an X chromosome from each of you to create me,” said Andrea, looking out the window of the lab somewhat vacantly and pressing her hand against the glass, “I understand they needed a stable sample of the SEP serum. It will not emotionally compromise me.”

“Good to know,” said Reaper.

“In spite of the side effects of the Zurich explosion, your genetic enhancements give you significant advantage over Morrison,” said Andrea, “87% of battle simulations have predicted that you kill him—statistically, he should have died 11 years ago at the latest, yet still he lives.”

“…they put battle simulations in with the rest of your brainwashing?” said Reaper.

“They made me to finish this,” said Andrea, “The simulations are necessary.” A long pause passed between them. “Are you emotionally compromised, sir?” she asked.

“Akande asks me the same damn thing all the time,” said Gabe, “If the statistics already say I am, what does it matter what _I_ say?”

“It gauges your own awareness of your emotional compromise,” said Andrea.

“…god, there is just no wiggle room with you, is there? You’re worse than Jack,” muttered Reaper.

“I’m better than Jack,” said Andrea, “That’s the point, sir.”


	39. Aedan's First Watchpoint Christmas

The box appeared outside the gates of the watchpoint some time in the small hours of the morning, Christmas day. All the watchpoint security cameras picked up was a spiral of black smoke and the box just… appearing there. It was wrapped in twine and brown paper, with a “To: Aedan” tag and a “Do not open until Christmas” stamp on it. The poor little box had gone through the gauntlet being scanned by every device imaginable on the watchpoint. All confirmed. No electrical bugging. No corrosive or explosive materials. No Vishkar tech. Aedan was still in his pajamas (or rather the Overwatch logo-slathered sweats which he used as pajamas) when Jack had summoned him to Winston’s lab, at a weary 5 in the morning, to hand him the box. 

“Is this from you?” said Aedan, looking over the box.

Jack shook his head.

“…Do I have to open it in front of you?” said Aedan.

“I wish I could say, ‘I don’t think Talon would pull anything on Christmas,’ but I wouldn’t put it past them,” said Jack, rubbing sleep out of his eyes.

 He handed Aedan a boxcutter and Aedan cut the twine, tore past the brown paper, and cut the tape securing the box open. Jack leaned over his shoulder slightly as Aedan pulled out an old pair of his skinny jeans, a  _new_  pair of corduroy pants, several of his old shirts (the blackstar shirt, the Velvet Underground shirt, a tacky gag shirt that read ‘Pipette, Cry, Repeat,’ and two dress shirts), old and new underwear, and one of those athletic wear quarter-zip base layer wool tops in black, new. 

“Well.. you won’t have to keep borrowing stuff from around the watchpoint as much,” Jack said with a shrug as Aedan pulled out a small envelope from the interior of the box. It was all done up in the fancy stationery of his mother’s Ministry of Genetics office, even embossed with a wax seal that bore the stylized double-helix of her office. Aedan didn’t think looking at something as boring as  _stationery_  would make him miss Oasis that much harder, but it did. He opened the letter.

_Dear Aedan, (And I assume Jack or Ana or the ape or whoever’s reading this because they’re probably treating you like a criminal at best there)—_

Aedan gave a glance to Jack, who was reading over his shoulder, and Jack gave a quiet scoff, before looking back at the letter.

_This is not forgiveness. This is not acceptance. This is only so you might have slightly more dignity while you’re on that Watchpoint (if they don’t burn this package like the animals they are). I acknowledge that you are my son and my creation and my responsibility, but I also acknowledge that you are your own person, and that you can make your own decisions (however terrible they may be). You have gone beyond my protection, and you are choosing to protect a world that will not protect you–it either takes a great deal of fearlessness or a great deal of stupidity to do that, and I know you take after me, so it must be mostly the former. You know I have never been one for blind faith or sentiment, and as such I have never placed much stock in these holidays. I will say that your presence in my life gave them more merit and your absence now makes them far more difficult than they ever were before. I don’t know what the future holds for you, but you may as well have some proper clothes to face it with._

_You are my greatest creation. I hope you never forget that, and I hope the world sees that, someday._

_Nollaig shona duit, a thaisce,_

_Mum_

Aedan closed the letter and tucked it back into the envelope.

“Sure manages to turn ‘I miss you’ into a mouthful, huh?” said Jack.

“Yes,” Aedan smiled a little, but then that smile faded.

 Jack awkwardly patted his shoulder. “This can’t be easy… first Christmas here, and all.”

“I can manage,” Aedan folded up some of the clothes he had taken out and put them back in the box, “Any plans?”

“Same old,” said Jack with a shrug, “If you want to spend your Christmas triangulating terrorist locations…”

“I’m good, thanks,” said Aedan, picking up the box.

—–

Aedan slept in another few hours that Christmas morning, had a light, lonely breakfast in the Watchpoint mess hall and returned to his quarters at the watchpoint dormitories. He was folding and putting away his new and old clothing in the locker at the foot of his bed when he accidentally knocked the box over pulling out the pair of corduroys and a small holographic-red foil wrapped object bounced out of the bottom of the box and rolled a little bit. Aedan picked it up and found it was a Christmas cracker.

“Not without your sense of humor, are you, Mum?” he said quietly. He wasn’t sure if it was an attempt at being festive or some sense of holiday traditions on her end, or if she was making clear how alone he was this holiday without someone to hold the other end of the tube. In any case, he shrugged and took hold of both ends of the foil.  _Might as well,_  he thought, pulling on the ends of it.

“Merry Christmas!” a clear voice cut across the room and Aedan flinched hard at the sudden sound, sundering the Christmas cracker with a loud pop. He looked over his shoulder to see Rei in the stairwell down to the dorms with a small wrapped package under her arm.

Aedan exhaled. “You really ought to give me more warning before you sneak up on me like that.”

Rei rolled her eyes and continued down the stairs, “I wasn’t ‘sneaking,’” she said with a smile, “Though I am naturally  _undetectable by the untrained eye…_ ” she spoke with mock gravitas and then made a chopping motion with her hand.

“Ninja,” both she and Aedan said at the same time and Rei snickered, “What was that? The popping?”

Aedan held up one half of the destroyed Christmas cracker. “Just… this—it’s stupid, don’t worry about it,” he said quietly, setting it aside.

“Huh… cool. Anyways–Here,” she held the box out to him.

“Oh–you didn’t have to–you really shouldn’t have–” Aedan started.

“I wanted to,” said Rei, holding the box out to him.

“When I say ‘You shouldn’t have’ I mean, ‘I don’t have anything to give you,’” said Aedan, glancing off.

“Aedan, I would literally be dead without you and you gave up everything to be here,” said Rei pushing the box forward, “Come on.”

Aedan bit the inside of his lip and took the box from her. The wrapping paper itself had some kind of nonsensical unicorns-in-santa-hats pattern on it and was hemorrhaging glitter. She watched with a smile on her face as he unwrapped it and lifted the lid off of the box. Inside was a round, flattened cylindrical object, roughly hand-sized in diameter.

“You said you missed your music the most right?” said Rei, “And you were also into like… ridiculously outdated stuff like vinyl or phonograms or whatever.”

“Just vinyl,” said Aedan, picking up the object out of the box, “This looks pre-crisis as well, though.”

“It’s a ‘C-D player!’” said Rei, as Aedan turned the object over, “Athena helped me, ‘burn a disc’ for it–which is what they called making music discs back then? That’s kind of dumb…like, why would you call it ‘burning,’ you know? Oh! Here!”

She pressed a button on top of the CD player, opening it up to reveal a CD covered with marker drawings and the words “Welcome to the Watchpoint” written in spiky letters.

“It’s got old and new stuff, Rajeev and Marti helped out, too,” said Rei, “We can burn another if you don’t like—“

She suddenly found herself caught up in a tight hug.

“ _Go raibh maith agat_ ,” his voice was muffled into her shoulder.

Rei smiled and patted his back. “Yeah! Uh… gurra ma-hagot to you too!”

A chuckle shook Aedan as he broke away from her with his hands on her shoulders. “I—sorry,” he pulled his hands away from her, “I can’t thank you enough for this. I really—I wish I could give you something…”

“Well you  _could_  handle dishes tonight,” said Rei, crossing her arms slyly.

“Dishes?” Aedan tilted his head.

“Y’know, after dinner,” said Rei.

“Dinner—you mean Christmas dinner.”

“Well yeah— Uncle Jesse always cooks way too much and the Amaris are over in Canada and—“

“You’re inviting me to Christmas dinner…” Aedan said the words, trying to make sense of them.

“Mm-hm!” Rei nodded, all bright eyes and wide smiles.

“Your mum hates me—“ Aedan started.

“Christmas armistice. If she can put up with Uncle Hanzo, she can put up with you. She’ll be nice. Promise,” said Rei, “And I’ve got your back.”

Aedan stood there, stunned for a few seconds. “Y-yes,” he managed at last, “I’d love to.”

“You know where our apartment is, right? Be there at 4!” said Rei, backing towards the stairwell, “We start early!”

“Right—early,” Aedan said, glancing over at the pile of clothes on his bed. His eyes flicked to the Christmas cracker, “Wait!” he blurted out, picking it up.

Rei paused on the stairwell as Aedan stepped up toward her. He picked through the Christmas cracker and gingerly unfolded a gold foil crown. “It’s… not a proper present but…” he trailed off and set the crown on her head. Normally the crowns from those poppers were annoyingly loose around the head, but the thickness of her hair kept the crown well-positioned. She looked better than most in it. Or maybe he just thought she looked better than most all the time. He wasn’t sure.

Rei adjusted the crown on her head slightly and smiled, “It’s perfect,” she said smiling.

“There’s a terrible joke that comes with it,” said Aedan, holding up a small slip of paper from the Christmas cracker.

“Save it for Uncle Jesse,” said Rei, gently chucking him on the chin, “Four o’ clock.”

“Four o’ clock,” Aedan repeated after her as she hurried up the stairs.The words sounded almost magical.

“Four o’ clock!” Rei’s voice trailed behind her even as she disappeared past the top of the stairs.

“Four o’ clock,” Aedan said quietly as Rei slipped off. His shoulders slumped slightly in a dreamlike stupor, as he stared up the stairwell. He stood there smiling for a few moments, but then he suddenly perked up. “Shit, I need to cook something.”


	40. Marti and Seye

To be fair, he was only 75% sure it was her when he saw her walk into the church. There were a few seconds where he was in the street, outside Dorado’s city hall, before he quickly crossed the street and entered the church. It’s probably not her, he thought, Probably. But he was lying to himself a little.  He looked around as he pushed the church doors open, and saw her lighting a candle in the alcove off to the left of the church’s entrance. She didn’t notice him. Unlike her. He watched as she rifled through the pocket of her jeans and pulled out a string of beads—a rosary, he realized. Her back was to him and she pulled her arms inward. Praying? A part of him felt as if he was violating something just by seeing her like this. He turned on his heel to exit the church. It probably wasn’t safe for them to talk anywa–

“Seye?” her voice bounced off the stucco of the walls and the earthen tiles of the floor and he stopped.

He glanced over his shoulder at her and her eyebrows raised slightly. Her hand reflexively went to her other pocket for her comm.

“I’m not here on a mission,” said Seye.

She furrowed her brow at him skeptically.

“Ogundimu Prosthetics wants to open up a factory here,” he explained, “I was just here with some shareholders surveying possible sites.”

She scoffed. “Rich boy,” she muttered, her hand slipping from her pocket.

“Errand girl,” he returned calmly, with an almost-smile.

“Not here on a mission either,” said Marti, stepping away from the alcove, “Just… remembering someone.”

“It’s a little early for the Festival De La Luz…” Seye murmured, looking at the candles behind her.

“Didn’t lose them in the Crisis,” said Marti.

There was a beat. “Oh—” Seye started, “Your mother?”

“Yeah,” said Marti. A long pause passed between them and she huffed a little. “Hey, walk with me?” she said, heading toward the exit of the church.”

“I can go if you need more time—” Seye started.

Marti shook her head and pocketed her rosary. “I could use someone to talk to, come on,” she said, pushing the door open.

It was a temperate evening, cooled by the wind off of the water. They walked side by side. Seye gave a glance to Marti’s hand drifting past her hip as she walked.

“Easier for your auntie to get me in her scopes, huh?” said Seye, glancing around the open air.

“Tantine hasn’t done that crap on one of my dates since I was 15,” said Marti, rolling her eyes.

“This is a date?” said Seye.

“I didn’t say this was a date,” said Marti, “This is walking and temporary armistice.”

“I like Off-Mission Marti,” said Seye.

“Well all it takes is one wrong move for you to get Mission Marti, so watch yourself,” said Marti.

Seye snickered and they continued walking through Dorado’s streets.

“I’m surprised you know about that,” Marti murmured after a while, glancing off, “About my mom.”

“The Canches Incident? Only from Talon’s perspective,” said Seye, shrugging, “They said it was one of the biggest tactical disasters in Talon’s history. Pretty much irreparably damaged our alliance with Los Muertos.”

“Poor poor Talon,” said Marti, glaring at him.

Seye caught himself and looked down, “I–sorry. What I mean is… that’s all I know about it.”

“And what was I in that story?”

“’’An asset imperative to Los Muertos and Talon’s continued collaboration,’” said Seye, with a slight boredom as if he were quoting some kind of textbook, “All that fighting over one little girl though… When I was a kid, it almost made you seem like a princess.”

Marti snorted.

“Don’t worry, I know better, now,” said Seye with a grin.

“Rude,” said Marti, smiling and bumping her shoulder against his as they came to a stop and took a seat at a bench overlooking the cliffs of Dorado’s bay. The boats glittered out on the water, little yellow lights set in deep blue.

“We should catch each other off-mission more often,” said Seye.

“What about ‘Only through conflict do we evolve?’” said Marti, folding her arms.

“Implying flirting with you isn’t an uphill battle,” said Seye, smiling.

Marti reddened and scoffed a little, glancing off and fidgeting with her braid. “You know we’re stupidly risking a lot just… being like this,” said Marti, leaning forward on the bench, looking out at the horizon.

“It’s not stupid to me,” said Seye, tucking a loose bit of Marti’s dark hair back. She caught his hand and he was ready to withdraw it, but she just held it there, as if she wasn’t sure what to do with it, still staring out at the water. After a few beats, she brought his hand down, still holding it and leaned her head on his shoulder.

“You ever wonder what we would look like if it weren’t for this stupid fight?” asked Marti.

“I wouldn’t know you if it weren’t for this ‘stupid fight,’” said Seye.

“So conflict is a good thing because you know me,” said Marti, flatly.

“Conflict is conflict,” said Seye, “It makes things happen. It’s reaction. It’s cauterization. It’s catharsis.”

“It hurts people.”

“Everything does.” 

“Cut the Doomfist rhetoric–” said Marti, bringing her head off his shoulder, “What do  _you_  actually want?”

“It’s not that simple—” Seye started.

“What do you want, Seye?” Marti said again.

“I know I  _don’t_  want oblivion,” said Seye, “I don’t want to see the people of this world cowering in corners and sending out heroes to die for people who don’t have the guts to fight for themselves. I don’t want to see  _you_ —” he caught himself and glanced off.

“Seye…?” Marti was staring at him.

Seye was frowning, staring out at the boats glittering on the water.

“Do you know what your name means?” he said after a long silence.

“…Girl Martin?” said Marti.

“Servant of Mars. God of War,” said Seye, leaning back against the backrest of the bench.

Marti huffed. “I’m not anyone’s servant.”

“You’re fighting Jack Morrison’s fight because he’s too old,’ said Seye.

“I’m fighting  _my_  fight because  _Talon took my mom,_ ” said Marti, “But what does that make you? Do you see yourself being anything other than the next Doomfist? Do you?” said Marti.

“If I don’t, someone worse will,” said Seye. There was a flatness in his voice.

“The first Doomfist was a hero, wasn’t he?” Marti’s voice softened.

Seye scoffed. “That’s all propaganda Adawe spun up to keep humans and omnics from killing each other when Numbani was first founded. You don’t actually think I could—”

“I do,” said Marti.

Seye paused and blinked in disbelief for a few seconds before clearing his throat. “It’s not that easy,” said Seye.

“’It’s not that easy.’ ‘It’s not that simple.’ It’s  _conflict,_  isn’t it?!” said Marti, putting a hand on his shoulder and turning him toward her, “I thought you didn’t shy away from that.”

“You’re obviously just goading me at this point,” said Seye, staring into her brown eyes.

“So are you going to back down?” said Marti, leaning in slightly.

“…angry mutinous pep talks and batting your eyelashes aren’t going to make me defect, you know,” said Seye, leaning in as well.

“Oh I haven’t even started yet,” said Marti as his fingers wove into her dark hair. The distance was closing. She could feel his breath on her nose. “For the record… this is.. really stup–”

Seye’s comm rang and both quickly flinched away from each other.

“Do your people have eyes on us!?” said Marti, looking around.

“What? No! I don’t need babysitters!” snapped Seye, answering his comm, “What?” he spoke into the comm, “No, I’m fine—Yes, I’ll still make it to the transport….No, we’re still deciding—” he cut himself off and glanced over at Marti, “Yes, I’m still making the rendezvous–I’ll call you back.” He clicked the comm shut and looked back at Marti. “I…” he trailed off.

“Rich boy stuff,” said Marti.

“Yeah,” said Seye with a shrug. Both sat in silence. “That… that got weird for a minute, huh?”

“We’re both in a fight that started 30 years before either of us were even born. There’s nothing about this that isn’t weird,” said Marti. 

“Yeah…” Seye itched at his jawline.

“You never answered it, you know,” said Marti.

“Answered what?”

“What do you think we would look like if there was no Talon? No Overwatch?”

Seye thought for a moment. “I don’t know… stuff like this maybe… walks in the city… watching martial arts movies with terrible dubbing… an apartment with solar panels and a vertical garden someday… maybe a dog…”

“I’m more of a cat person,” said Marti.

“Then clearly we’re destined to be in conflict forever,” said Seye. 

Marti snickered.

“Well…” Seye shrugged and moved to walk off, “As you say, I’ve got rich boy stuff to attend to. ”

“Hey–” Marti caught his arm, then stood on her tiptoes, only managing to land a kiss on his jawline. “For the record, I like off-mission Seye, too.”

Seye brushed his fingers against the point where her lips had touched, then gently placed his and on the back of her head and pulled her in slightly to kiss her forehead.

“Until next time, Martina,” he said, walking off.


	41. Reaper and Andrea

Italy was not a hoodie country, especially not in summer. Gabe was feeling the heat, but a part of him was grateful his body still remembered how to make the nerve endings that felt the heat. If there was one good thing that came with Andrea, it’s that they were able to synthesize treatments from her DNA to ease the ongoing war between Moira’s nanites and genetic treatments, the SEP serum, and the residual effects of Mercy’s Resurrection-Gone-Wrong in his body. He wasn’t falling apart like he used to, but he wasn’t aging normally either. Sure there were more wrinkles, more gray hairs, but not enough. Not enough to match up to how old he  _felt_  now. They were in Rialto for a mission direction and oversight, not infiltration on their own. A few hours of observation and they were able to dispatch the target well within the predicted time frame, now it was just a matter of waiting for the pickup. They were in a gelato shop, around 11 in the morning. Andrea was in civvies. If the heat was giving Andrea any discomfort in her jeans, she wasn’t showing it as she frowned at the various tubs of gelato behind the glass. Reaper’s face was hidden by a Medico della Peste mask, which made him and Andrea blend in better as tourists than expected. 

“Your daughter—very beautiful, yes?” the gelataio spoke from behind the counter.

Andrea didn’t show any reaction to being called beautiful. Reaper glanced up at him.

“…Granddaughter?” the gelataio ventured.

Reaper just cleared his throat. “Cioccolato all’arancia e cioccolato con peperoncini, per favore,” he said, managing the best he could from his little phrasebook.

“Ah of course!” said the gelataio, scooping up two sugar cones for them. Reaper paid the man and the two of them ate their gelato on a garden bench next to the canals. Andrea watched an architectural maintenance drone scanning the worn-down bricks on the side of the building.

“Kind of nice to just be here without an army bearing down on me,” muttered Reaper, looking around. 

“You’ve had missions here before, sir?” said Andrea, picking a bit of candied orange peel out of her gelato and staring at it.

“I had a mission here, and it went… well it went pretty sideways,” said Gabe.

Andrea seemed to process this for a few seconds. “Is that a joke, sir?” she asked.

Reaper huffed, “No, I know you want to believe I’m some amazing super-soldier—”

“You  _are_  a super-soldier, sir,” said Andrea.

“The SEP serum doesn’t take away the ability to make a mistake… Well… I don’t think I can really say it was a mistake…There wasn’t a whole lot else to do except…” Reaper waved a hand dismissively and bit off a some gelato and a small section of his cone, letting both turn to mush in his mouth. They were both quiet for a long time. “Look,” Reaper said at last, “You want to believe that I’m a lot better than I am, because… there’s a whole lot of me in you. That’s fair. A lot of kids do that.” 

“I am not a child, sir,” said Andrea.

“Yeah but you’ve still only been alive for… well, are we counting the Amnio-tank years?” 

Andrea shrugged and took a bite of her gelato. No licks. A bite. Didn’t savor it or anything.

“You don’t have a whole lot of reference to go off of, is what I’m saying,” said Reaper, “There’s only so much all that brainwashing is going to give you, too.”

“I understand you have deficiencies sir. You are old–”

“Okay–”

“Still suffer breakdowns of nano-cellular cohesion—”

“It’s gotten better—”

“And emotionally compromised—”

“Look–”

“But it’s all right,” said Andrea, “I am here to assist you.” 

“Great. Talon cloned me a killer nurse.”

“My medical training is minimal, sir, but I can undergo Mnemosyne treatments if–”

“You don’t need to put yourself through that thing. It’s fine,” said Reaper. He sighed. “This fight’s going to end someday, you know that, right?”

“I was made to end this fight,” said Andrea.

“You ever give any thought to what you’ll do with yourself when it’s over?” asked Reaper.

“…That is not my concern until it is over,” said Andrea, “I suppose it would depend on what your orders at the time will be.”

“Of course,” said Reaper.

“Unless I receive orders to kill you,” said Andrea, “In which case I would be awaiting orders from my other superiors.”

“Also a possibility,” said Reaper.

A pause passed between them and Andrea suddenly chuckled. It wasn’t her awkward and unsettlingly forced “Ha ha ha” when she saw he was laughing and opted to imitate him because it ‘seemed appropriate,’ it was an honest to god chuckle. It was Jack’s chuckle, the way it split across from the right corner of her mouth and made her shoulders bunch up. She quickly caught herself and cleared her throat. “Apologies, sir,” she said.

“At ease. Think of something funny?” said Reaper.

“I thought ‘I would like if I was ordered to come back here,’” said Andrea and then she snorted, “But it’s a tactical nightmare! The buildings are decrepit, movement could easily be hindered by flooding, and there are too many choke points! My strike team could easily be slaughtered! Isn’t that funny, sir? That I would want to come back here?”

Reaper didn’t really know how to respond to that. Andrea waited on his reaction, his face unreadable with the top half of it covered by the Medico mask, and then Andrea glanced off. “I’ll get better at telling jokes, sir,” she said.

 “I’ve wanted to come back here for a while,” said Reaper, “You can want things, you know. Like… want things for their own sake. You don’t need to have the pretense of a mission or order for everything you want.”

Andrea looked at her gelato, then out to the canals, “I’ll want things when the fight is over,” she said, now apparently satisfied with this conclusion.


	42. Halloween Special: A Bunch of Teens in a Horror Movie

The five of them sat cross-legged on the floor of Chateau Guillard, the fire crackling next to them as Rei held the flashlight under her face. It wasn’t very frightening at all. Even in the cavernous hall of the chateau, between the fire, the flashlight, the LEDs veining Samir and Rajeev’s costumes, it was a bit too well lit to be properly eerie, but that didn’t stop Rei.

“A dark presence coalesced in their midst….” she spoke with all the gravitas of a practiced storyteller, “It was…. the Reaper!”

A series of groans sounded from the group. 

“Rei–the Reaper’s shown up like… six times already in the story” said Marti.

“Well he can’t really be killed, that’s kind of the point,” said Rei.

“Didn’t the Reaper show up already?” asked Aedan, his attention divided between speaking to Rei and attempting to contact juggle his costume’s crystal ball prop, “I mean they didn’t kill him off the last time, right?”

“…no,” said Rei.

“So what you’re saying is, there’s now two Reapers, who are both ‘The’ Reaper, running around the defenders at this point,” said Samir, popping a piece of candy into his mouth.

“Look, I’m just telling the story how Reinhardt tells it,” said Rei, setting the flashlight aside and readjusting the large red bow in her hair.

“Yeah but he’s been telling the same one for years now,” said Marti, leaning back.

“I mean he switches it up—” said Rajeev with a shrug, “Changes the heroes around….”

“But he never explains why the alchemist is also a pirate,” said Samir. 

“Well we could add new heroes and villains,” suggested Rei, scanning the group, “There could be…”

“A dragoon!” said Rajeev, “Wielder of fiery magics and bearer of a shield unbreakable!”

“Yeah!” said Rei, her eyes flicked to Samir, “And a Ranger,” she added, smiling, “Able to track any quarry, whose venturings lead him to Adlersbrunn.”

“I like rangers,” said Samir with a shrug. 

“And…” Rei’s glance trailed over to Aedan.

“The Goblin Prince,” suggested Aedan.

“The ghoul,” said Rei.

“Ha!” Rajeev elbowed, “You’re a ghoul!”

“The ghoul wasn’t one of the defenders, obviously, but a loyal servant of the Hellspawn—the unholy progeny of Witch and Demon,” Rei continued.

“‘Loyal servant?’“ Aedan muttered a bit bitterly.

“Aedan, would you get me a nano-cola from the cooler? My mouth’s getting dry,” said Rei.

“Of course,” said Aedan standing up and grabbing a can from the cooler without missing a beat before catching himself, “…dammit.”

“So we’re short on Defenders,” said Marti.

“Well there was the Princess, obviously,” said Rei.

“Princess?!” said Marti.

“Well it feels like more of its own character than ‘artificer,’” said Rei.

“…You’re just going off my DnD character,” said Marti, flatly.

“Wait–So  _I’m_  the ghoul, but  _she_  gets to be the princess?!” said Aedan.

“It’s her house,” said Rei.

“But I mean, even if we bring in the new characters, how much does the story change?” said  Samir.

“It’s always a door. It’s always Junkenstein, it’s always an endless assault of monsters.” said Marti.

“Not really much of an arc, is there?” said Aedan.

“Scary stories aren’t about arcs,” said Rei, “They’re about scaring.”

“Surely a bunch of weirdoes who grew up squatting on a paramilitary base have better scary stories than just that one, right?” said Aedan.

“You’re one to talk,” scoffed Marti.

“You don’t want to hear Talon scary stories,” said Aedan.

“Wait–you mean there actually is one?” said Rajeev.

“Well I don’t know if it’s a story or it actually happened…” said Aedan.

“Convenient,” said Samir.

“C’mooon spooky Talon shit!!” said Rajeev, grinning.

Aedan rolled his eyes a little. “I don’t know if the Talon guards made this up to mess with me, but… I and my… near-siblings weren’t Talon’s first venture into human cloning. One of their goals was replicating the SEP serum–in its originality, not changed like it was in Reyes, and the easiest way they could do that, they figured, was by cloning Jack Morrison. It was never hard to get his DNA, he leaves it all over the battlefield.”

“Gross,” said Marti with a smirk.

“Not remotely what I’m talking about but anyway,” Aedan continued, “They called the project, ‘76 Beta.’ From what I heard, the first attempt was… messy. Dangerous… I suppose that’s why Mum opted to treat me with Mnemosyne during my gestation…”

“Okay–back up–what’s Mnemosyne?” said Samir.

“Brainwashing tech,” said Rei with a shudder, “Aedan–I don’t want to hear this story if it’s got… that… in it.”

“It doesn’t, don’t worry,” said Aedan, briefly touching her hand, “And well…” he looked at the others, “That was sort of the problem. What they made was a killing machine. It was the perfect weapon to take down Overwatch, but they had forgotten to give 76 Beta one crucial element…”

“Balls,” said Rajeev before getting elbowed hard in the side by Samir.

“Loyalty,” said Aedan, “You make a killer, you’d better make sure it kills the right people. 76 Beta didn’t. They found the first body just outside 76 Beta’s containment cell. His handler. Head twisted all the way around. Then there came the first labtech, nearly decapitated from the jaw—no idea what with. They think it was a ceiling tile. Then the next two labtechs. Scalpels studding the bodies like pins in a map. Then another after that. Dangling from the ceiling…”

“Talon really goes through evil lab henchmen fast, huh?” said Marti.

“…turnover’s pretty high, but you’d be surprised how many they’re able to recruit. Brutal job market out there,” said Aedan.

“So what did Slasher 76 say then?” said Rajeev.

“76 Beta,” said Aedan.

“Slasher 76 sounds cooler,” said Rajeev.

Aedan shrugged. “He didn’t talk much… or at all. Didn’t have to… his actions were message enough–He wanted Talon to know that he wanted out, and that there was only so long they could contain him. They made him smart, too… knew how to injure some scientists… you’d hear them crying for help, but it was all a trap. To draw out more victims. ” Aedan leaned back a little where he sat, looking up at the chandelier which hung overhead, “In fairness, he was only doing it because he didn’t really know how to do anything else… But in the end they still couldn’t hold him. Talon facilities have gotten a lot more secure since then–Built to contain the things they create.”

“…so they never found him?” said Samir.

“That’s what they told me. If he’s real though, he’s probably dead of starvation or exposure at this point. I mean this was years ago.”

The others kept a level gaze at Aedan.

“That’s it?” said Samir.

“That’s it,” said Aedan.

“Oh come on! You’re supposed to say something like,  _‘Some say he may wander these very hills looking for his next victim oooooohhhh!’_ ” said Rajeev.

“Yeah kind of fizzled out towards the end, there,” said Marti.

“ _I_  think it was spooky,” said Rei, smiling.

“Thank you,” said Aedan, folding his arms with a  _‘See?’_  look at the others.

“But…” Rei started.

“But?” said Aedan.

“But you need people to root for, or at least people to get picked off one by one by the slasher to keep the stakes high. Like… what if there were two Talon labtechs making out–”

“Why would the Talon labtechs be making out?” said Aedan.

“Well y’know, to keep the audience invested,” said Rei, “Also Slashers always go for making out couples. That’s just how it works.”

Aedan scoffed. “Fine. There were two Talon labtechs making out and then–” he was cut off by the sound of the door in the foyer being knocked. It was a massive door, and the brass knocker collided against the oak with a half-clang, half-thud.

   _Boom. Boom. Boom._

“…what was that?” said Rei.

“Trick or Treaters?” said Aedan.

“France,” said Marti.

“Pizza, maybe?” said Samir.

“We’re in a Chateau in the middle of a lake,” said Marti.

“Pizza boat?” suggested Rajeev.

The knocking came again, more insistent this time.

   _Boom. Boom. Boom._

“We have to answer it,” said Rei.

“I mean, do we have to though? Really?” said Samir, “Kind of creepy that someone would make the effort to come all the way out to Chateau when all the partying is going to be going on in town and stuff…”

The door knocked again, steady, sure knocks.

   _Boom. Boom. Boom._

“Nose goes,” said Marti.

“What–?” Rei started but looked to see everyone had touched their index finger to the tip of their nose.

“Come on, Rei, thought you were the ninja,” said Samir.

“Jerks,” said Rei, standing up and brushing off her purple dress. She gave a glance down to her broomstick prop and picked it up.

“You’re spooked,” said Samir with a smile.

“I am not! I just–It completes the costume look. Y’know, in case it’s trick or treaters,” said Rei, setting the broom on her shoulder as she walked away from the fires into the dark hall of the Chateau.

“It’s not trick or treaters,” said Marti as she and the others traveled behind Rei in a clump.

The four of them edged around the massive arch that separated the main hall from the foyer as Rei walked up to the massive front door of the Chateau. Rei reached a hand out to the door, nearly touching on the door handle then flinched and jumped back a little as the door knocked again.

   _Boom. Boom. Boom._

It was so much louder in the empty dark stone of the Foyer. She gave a glance back to the others peering around the foyer arch. The fingers of Rei’s free hand tightened on the broomstick as she once again reached her hand forward. Her hand hesitated for a second as the knocking came again.

   _Boom. boom. boo-_

Rei opened the door with the same kind of ‘just get it over with’ fury you would have at ripping off a bandaid, then she staggered back to see a tall figure standing before her in a hockey mask, chainsaw in one hand. An unearthly orange glow emanated from the hockey mask’s eyes and mouth vent and Rei’s breath shuddered in her throat as she heard a collective gasp of the other kids behind her. 

“Trick or treat,” the voice had all the gravelly familiarity of Jack’s.

Rei screamed–all the kids screamed. Then Rei kicked the looming figure square between the legs, prompting him to double over, which earned him a door right in the head as Rei slammed the door shut on him.

“Door bar! Door bar! Door bar!” Marti said the words so fast Rei had no idea what she was talking about. Marti sprinted into the foyer and brought the door bar down in front of the Chateau’s main door. Both Rei and Marti were panting with panic.

“Okay,” Marti huffed, “The Chambre Princesse has the highest security in the Chateau. Everyone sleeps in my room tonight, we take turns keeping watch. All in favor?”

“Aye,” the other four spoke simultaneously.

“Okay, good, glad we’re all on the same page,” said Marti.

—

Jack Morrison was curled up in pain on the stone tiles right in front of the Chateau, his breath leaving him in a high-pitched wheeze. His comm came on in his ear.

“So how are chaperone duties coming along?” Mercy’s voice crackled in his ear.

The painful wheeze was still edging out of him for another few seconds.

“Jack?” Mercy spoke again.

“I barely said two words and your daughter just screamed in my face and kicked me in the balls,” said Jack.

“Wow–” Sombra snorted over the comm, “What did you say?”

“Trick or Treat,” said Jack.

“So I mean… technically that was a trick,” said Sombra.

Jack groaned, attempting to exhale the remainder of the painful empty-stomached feeling. “Your children are terrible,” he said, “All of them.”


	43. Dropship Slumber Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First fic featuring Jaime, an adoptive McHanzo kid.

The mission was over, but they were still grounded in Volskaya. The necessary calls back to the Watchpoint had been made, all there was to do now was wait. If they had come in the Orca, maybe Athena could have brought them through the snowstorm, but their little dropship couldn’t make such a trip. It wasn’t so bad, really. The drop ship was easily tucked away in one of the shipping yards lining the Volga, and had plenty of power to keep them warm through the night. A half-finished Svyatogor loomed over them.

 Rajeev was snoring like a chainsaw, but exhaustion had swept over the rest of them too hard and too fast for any of them to mind. The floor of the drop ship was only just big enough to accommodate all of their sleeping mats and the dropship’s emergency blankets. The moonlight off the snow and the streetlights along with the faint lights of the dropship’s controllers lit up the space in dim periwinkle and orange. The twins were… sort of sleeping head-to-toe, but had folded into each other, back-to back, their legs crooking into each other neatly at the knees. When they were awake they were both so different in the way they carried themselves and their expressions, but here they reminded Marti a bit of an old fashioned playing card–the diagonal symmetry of a face card with one reflection having significantly longer hair than the other, but still appearing as a reflection.

 Rei and Aedan were sleeping far more closely than either of their parents would approve of, Jaime’s legs keeping them apart from the waist down, they had bowed toward each other like a cathedral arch, Aedan’s pale hand only an inch or two from Rei’s loosely curled fist. Jaime, (who was originally supposed to be the buffer between Rei and Aedan) had propped himself up against a wall so he could stretch his legs out better. Marti kept watch at the dropship’s window.

“You still up?” a quiet murmur brought Marti’s eyes away from the window. Jaime had pulled his hood back slightly, his skin looking almost bluish in the moon-off-the-snow light coming from the window.

“Go back to sleep. I’ll let you know when it’s your shift,” Marti said quietly.

“I can sleep anywhere,” Jaime said, keeping his voice low as well, readjusting himself against the wall, “I’ve just been thinking—like…” he glanced down at the twins, “What do you think we’d be doing right now if we weren’t… y’know…”

“Overwatch?” said Marti.

“Yeah,” said Jaime.

“Well  _you_  could’ve stayed back in Arizona,” said Marti, shifting her own seating.

“Or I could be dumpster diving,” said Jaime with a shrug. 

“You could have stayed where it was safe—”

“Relatively safe,” said Jaime, “Y’know, Deadlock and all.”

“You didn’t have to fight,” said Marti.

“Neither do you,” said Jaime.

Marti’s lips pursed slightly.

“I get it,” said Jaime, “It’s different for you. Personal.”

“And what is it for you?” said Marti.

 “Personal too, but.. different reasons. Hanging around on an agave farm didn’t feel right if you guys were out here fighting and risking everything…”

“Aw, you like us,” said Marti.

“Don’t tell Samir,” said Jaime, smiling.

Marti snorted softly. A long pause passed between them and the wind outside made the dropship shudder slightly.

“So… sleepover,” said Jaime, looking down at the others, “Is this the part where we braid each others’ hair? Talk about crushes?”

“It’s  _supposed_  to be the part where you sleep,” said Marti.

“You could sleep too,” said Jaime.

“Team leader. First watch,” said Marti, looking out the window again.

“Jack’s favorite has to be a hard-ass,” said Jaime with a shrug.

“I’m not Jack’s–” Marti started at a normal volume and caught herself, her eyes flicking down to the others as Aedan stirred slightly murmuring something between Irish and Arabic. She dropped her voice back down to a more quiet level, “ _I’m_  only a hard-ass when  _you’re_  a dumbass.” 

Jaime smirked. “You didn’t answer,” he said, “Where do you think you’d be if you weren’t in Overwatch?”

“I don’t know,” said Marti, “I guess… my mom would still be alive—or things could be really bad and I could be with my dad… I think I’d be putting every bit of my energy towards trying to get out of Dorado. Find somewhere safe. I was six so I barely knew what was going on at the time, but I remember that’s what Mom was always talking about.” Marti looked out the window again, watching a hunk of ice drift past on the Volga. A long pause passed between them, filled only by the sound of Rajeev’s snoring. “You never talk about your birth parents,” said Marti.

“Not a lot to talk about,” said Jaime, rolling his knuckles slightly.

“What’s going on?” said Marti.

“It’s nothing,” said Jaime.

“Jaime,” Marti said his name and he rolled his eyes slightly.

“I just… I do want to help. I do want to fight. I don’t know about all this ‘hero’ stuff but I know I like you guys enough that I want to back you up. But I keep trying to think of what life is going to look like in a world where we’re not… doing this. I keep wondering—”

“If we’re going to be spending our entire lives fighting like the people who raised us?” said Marti, looking out the window.

“Yeah…” said Jaime, “I mean Jack’s  _still going_ , and I’m pretty sure the only things holding him together at this point are spite and SEP serum.”

Marti huffed a little. “It’s not just spite. It’s us. He wanted the fighting to be done before any of us had to…” she trailed off, “I’m not his favorite,” she said quietly, “He just… he trusts me to want this fight to end just as much as he does. He trusts me to end this fight. To make sure all of you end this fight.” 

Jaime was quiet for a few beats longer.

“You’re still his favorite though,” he said with a smile.

Marti scoffed. 

“Does he know about your whole thing with the Ogundimu kid or–?”

“He’s… vaguely aware,” said Marti with an eye roll.

“You aren’t denying the ‘thing’ anymore!” said Jaime, “Progress!”

Samir grunted in his sleep and Marti put a finger to her lips and Jaime dropped his voice back down. “Sorry,” he whispered, “Progress.”

“Are we back at the ‘talking about crushes’ stage of the sleepover?” said Marti, “Because I would love to find out about you and–”

“Oh look at that, I am…” Jaime yawned, “I am all talked out. I guess I’m at the ‘sleep’ part of the sleepover,” he settled himself back up against the wall of the dropship, “G’night, intrepid leader—”

“Ass,” said Marti.

“Hard-ass,” said Jaime with his eyes closed.


	44. Snooping Around The Shambali Monastery

“…I don’t think we’re supposed to be here,” said Aedan, his eyes trailing upward as they headed deeper into the sanctum. 

“Scared?” Rei looked over her shoulder with a slight smile.

“Tch, no,” said Aedan, maybe lying a little as they descended the stairs onto a stone platform with a line of light thrusting itself upward from a glowing white half-dome in the center of the floor, framed by gold semi circles trailing up to the ceiling, “Just… cautious…” he said, looking over the edge of the platform into the deep pit just next to it.

“I mean, we’re not omnics,” said Rei with a shrug as she stepped around the cylinder of light, “It’s not like it can do anything to—” She had reached her hand out to touch one of the yellow semi-circles and immediately the arc of light spun and expanded and dozens of small star-like lights sprung out from the white half-dome in the center of the floor.

“We should go…” said Aedan, gingerly easing around the star holograms that now surrounded them both, avoiding touching any of them.

“Are you serious?” said Rei, gesturing at the lights around them, “Look at this! It’s beautiful!”

“Yes, we are in agreement. It’s beautiful. But neither of us are powerful omnic mystics, and therefore—” Aedan cut himself off as he saw Rei extending a hand toward a particularly bright little light close to the center of the stone platform, “Wait–don’t—”

Rei touched the star and suddenly all the little star holograms filling the chamber disappeared.

“There,” said Rei, putting her hands on her hips, “Fixed it.”

“Good. Now we can go–” Aedan started but then they heard another voice.

“ _You’re leaving?_ ”

“What?” Aedan turned on his heel to see a hologram of a tall omnic that looked like Zenyatta yet wasn’t, standing at the base of the stairs.

_“I do not believe I have a place here anymore,”_  they heard Zenyatta’s voice and turned around to see a hologram of Zenyatta at the other end of the platform.

“If that’s Master,” said Rei, she looked over her shoulder, “Then that’s…”

_“You’re my brother. Your place is at my side, where it has always been,”_  said the other Omnic.

“…Mondatta,” said Rei.

_“We are not celebrities,”_  the Zenyatta hologram’s voice was short, more bitter than Rei knew it could be,  _“We are not pedagogues.”_

_“Of course we are not,”_ said the Mondatta hologram,  _“These are merely images the humans project onto us to give themselves more security. They want to hear our message, Brother. They want to join the embrace of the Iris. Who are we to deny them?”  
_

_“I am not denying them anything,”_  said the Zenyatta hologram,  _“But this is not the way.”_

_“Where will you go?”_  said the Mondatta hologram.

_“I do not know yet. The Iris will guide me,”_  said the Zenyatta hologram.

_“I never thought it would lead you away from me,”_  said the Mondatta hologram.

_“…I suppose that is one thing we can agree upon,”_  said the Zenyatta hologram, floating away and out of range. Suddenly all the lights faded and returned to their previous states of semi-circular lines revolving around the line at the center of the platform.

“…You ever get the feeling you just saw something you didn’t really have a right to see?” said Aedan.

“I wonder if that was the last time they ever talked before…” Rei trailed off, “Maybe that’s why he wants Dad and Uncle to get along so much…” she murmured.

“What?” said Aedan.

Rei shook her head. “Nothing. Just talking to myself. Let’s get out of here.”


	45. Dragonback Pt. 1

“Foolish human! You think you can stand against me!?” the rubber antennae on Iron Kaijin’s helm wobbled a little as he threw his head back in a villainous laugh.

“I’ve come to put a stop to your evil!” declared Yoshimi, striking a pose before making a diagonal waving motion with her arms. “HENNNNN _SHIN!_ ”

“And cut,” Glitchbot motioned from the director’s chair, “Switch to camera two–Stunt, to your mark.” 

Rei felt her own breath bouncing back onto her face from the interior of her helmet as the lead actress did an awkward half-jog out of the shot, gave Rei a small high-five as she ran out, and Rei hurried out to the mark surrounded by the Iron Kaijin’s henchmen and assumed that same diagonal arm position.

“Okay, kid, just like in rehearsal, remember the choreography. Take four in three, two, one–Action,” said Glitchbot.

“Midori Rider!?” Iron Kaijin staggered back in shock.

“That’s right!” Rei struck a pose, “Ready to surrender!?” Rei knew her voice would be edited out and replaced with Yoshimi’s in post-production–too rhotic, too clunky, Glitchbot had said, but they still needed to time the dialogue right.

“Never! All shall know of the crushing defeat of Midori Rider at the hands of me! Iron Kaijin! Attack!”

Rei felt Glitchbot’s eyes on her as the first henchman actor swung a halbred at her and she dodged into a series of backhand springs, more rubber halberds swinging at her just before and behind her springs. She spiraled on the last spring, going into a spinning handstand and praying the costume wouldn’t rip as she kicked two actors who threw themselves back at the contact of her feet.

   _Not too hard,_  she had to remind herself every time her foot or fist made contact with another actor,  _Not too hard._ It had to look like a fight, but she had to think of it as a dance, moving from mark to mark, dodge this halberd, stumble back from that halberd, to your mark in three, two, one— She sidestepped to a taped ‘x’ on the ground and crossed her arms in front of herself and shouted, “Lightning Staff!”

 The actors leapt away from her and sparks flew out from the ground on either side of her as she made the signature diagonal arm movement, and Glitchbot said, “Good, end take on camera two, cut to camera one again,” as a bright blue and yellow staff was tossed to Rei from out of the shot. She broke two in rehearsal. She knew the props department kind of hated her. The fight went faster with the staff–she had to focus not only on not breaking her staff, but not breaking the halberds of any of the henchman actors—except that actor with the breakaway halberd, but choreography had him breaking it pretty much on his own with the lightest touch of her staff.

 She wondered how much her uncle would scoff at the unnecessary flourishes and staff spins–he’d always chided her for using too much energy too fast in a fight… she wondered if watching her fight like this made him even more gray. She smiled a little under the mask as she ducked under a halberd and swiped the legs of an actor with her staff, making him throw himself onto his back.

“Impossible!” Iron Kaijin shouted, “No Rider before you could master the staff so quickly!”

“Camera two again–close up,” said  Glitchbot.

“Ha!” Rei spun the staff for a flourish before planting it on the ground triumphantly in front of her, “Reconsidering that surrender?”

“Never!” shouted Iron Kaijin. He made his own flourishing gesture, “You will pay for your insolence!” He threw his arms out on either side of him “Iron Firestorm!” 

“Yeeeaaaaagh!” Rei threw herself back and tumbled across the floor at… nothing.The dozens of flaming swords of light would be added in in post-production.

“Attack her now! She’s vulnerable!” Iron Kaijin ordered his henchmen and Rei was set on by half a dozen rubber halberds jabbing at her. Rei took the brief second she was on her back to try and focus. This was the part in rehearsal where she broke the staff–she couldn’t screw it up this time.

“Switch to camera three,” said Glitchbot, “Special effects in three, two,—”

“Lightniiiiing Tornadoooooo!” Rei shouted and sparks fired up from the floor as the actors threw themselves back from her. She was spinning the staff as she kicked up from her back to her feet.

“Fools! Imbeciles!” cried Iron Kaijin as Rei smacked one actor back with the staff while kicking another, “I have to do everything myself! Iron Inferno!” 

“Tech on 2,” said Glitchbot as several plumes of flame shout out of the floor. Rei did several flips as they fired up not particularly close to her. The flaming swords, again, would be added in post-production, “Close up–big finish.” 

“What?! No one has dodged my Iron Inferno!” said Iron Kaijin, staggering back.

“No one but  _Midori Rider!_ ” Rei landed and spun the staff over her head in a similar diagonal movement to the one she was making with her arms earlier. “Midori Storm Kick!” She leapt into the air and collided hard with the actor. The rubber of his costume absorbed a lot of the impact but she could hear the hollow sucking sound of the wind being knocked out of her coworker. And she had been doing so well not hitting everyone else too hard. He fell back flat on his back and Glitchbot shouted “Cut! Great going, team! I think that’s the one!”

Iron Kaijin was groaning on the ground and Rei held a hand out to him. “Uh–hey, sorry. Got a little too into it at the end there.”

He took her hand and staggered to his feet, “It’s fine. Part of the job,” there was a chuckle in his voice, He looked over at the directer, “I was supposed to get that dramatic ‘Noooooo’ in there, though, should we re-shoot that last kick from camera 3 or–”

“Well no one can see your mouth in the mask–We can add it when we’re dubbing for Yoshimi,” said Glitchbot, “Speaking of which—Yoshimi, we’re going to need some re-shoots for the last classroom scene but Tech and Stunts–that’s a wrap for the season. Good job, people!” He clapped and a swell of cheering rose up from the group of henchmen actors. Rei clapped a little as well. Her stomach growled and she pulled off her Midori Rider helmet and shook out her hair from its wig cap. She wondered what craft services had today.

“Hey! Didn’t break the staff this time!” one of the hench actors clapped her on the shoulder.

“Ha-ha,” Rei said flatly, “And hey! Your staff broke at the right time!”

“Oh that’s cold–Hey, stunts and tech are having a little get-together tonight, you in?”

Rei laughed a little, “Yeah, that sounds–” something caught the corner of her eye in the dim lighting of the studio and she saw a narrow figure topped with red hair and her sentence dropped off.

“Rei?” the henchman said, and she blinked a couple of times and remembered she was still talking to someone.

“Sorry,” said Rei, “I uh–I’m just going to… uh…” Rei trailed off again as she walked off.

“Okay then?” the actor called after her as Rei pushed through the crowd of exiting actors and set staff to see Aedan. He was dressed in his usual skinny jeans, a blue-gray blazer and a white shirt that featured a crudely drawn frog-like creature with alien-like eyes on stalks captioned with the words, “Hi How Are You.” There was a small bouquet of peach-colored ranunculi in one of his hands. He had a ‘guest’ tag on. He needed a haircut. 

“Hey!” he gave a small wave, “I caught the tail end of that! You were—”

She hugged him tightly and there was a second or two where the sudden physical contact of her left him stunned until he managed to get it together and return the embrace.

“How’d you get here?” Rei pulled back from him slightly, arms still wrapped around him, “When did you get here? You should have called, I would have–”

“It was all sort of short notice,” said Aedan, itching at the back of his head, he brought up the small bouquet, “I uh–Here. Figured it was appropriate, you being an actress and all.”

“Stunt,” said Rei with a smile, “And usually flowers are more of a theater actor thing.”

“Oh no, you’ve torn apart my primary excuse for bringing you flowers–however shall I cope?” said Aedan with a smile. Rei snickered and elbowed him. “You look good–I mean well. Sentai work suits you.”

Rei looked down at her costume and smiled before looking back up at him. “Really though,” she said, “What’s going on?”

“Do you have a minute?” said Aedan, “Or–a couple of days?”

Rei’s smile shrank a little, “Dad and Uncle sent you, didn’t they?” she said, pushing her hair back.

“Well–I also volunteered,” said Aedan. 

“Please tell me this isn’t what I think this is about–” Rei started.

“They think they’ve got it this time,” said Aedan. 

Rei pursed her lips before exhaling, “Look–I can’t talk like this–I–I gotta get out of this costume.”

“Of course,” said Aedan.

—

Aedan leaned against the wall next to the door of Rei’s dressing room.

“So… you don’t seem very excited by the idea of it,” said Aedan.

“It’s not that I don’t want it back, Aedan, I’m just—You have no idea how exhausting it is getting my hopes up and getting disappointed over and over again,” Rei stepped out of the dressing room in a loose olive swing dress and sneakers, shouldering her purse as she walked down the hall towards the exit of the studio, “I mean… we’ve tried everything.”

Aedan’s eyes fell on the gold-whiskered muzzle of a dragon tattoo peeking out from the back of her dress’s neckline as she walked. “I know,” he said, walking after her, “But it’s different this time–It’s not another biotic treatment, it’s not another intensive meditation with the Shambali, we’ll need to head to Japan again but—”

“Japan?! No, that’s insane–The Shimada clan’s still probably on high alert from when I was getting this,” she pointed her thumb over her shoulder.

“Which is why we need to go now—your uncle’s spy network says the remaining clan heads are at some kind of conference in Hong Kong. And where we’re going, there’s not going to be anyone.”

“You’re going too?” said Rei.

“Well,” Aedan shrugged, “Until we get that dragon back, you’re probably going to need a medic on the team, and your mum’s busy with Jack’s latest set of injuries so…” 

“And you still feel responsible for it,” said Rei.

“I–” Aedan ran a hand through his hair, “I know I want to help you get it back.” Rei kept a steady look at him and he cleared his throat, “Plus it’s a softball mission, really. At the very least, if nothing happens, you get a few days camping out in Shirakami-Sanchi.” 

“You hate camping,” said Rei, folding her arms and smiling.

“Hey! I can be outdoorsy!” said Aedan.

Rei burst out laughing and managed to catch herself, “Sorry… I–yeah, we’re wrapping up on the season. I can probably get a few days off from Glitchbot. So where’d Dad and Uncle park the Orca?”

“Somewhere embarrassing, obviously,” said Aedan.

—

“Beautiful, isn’t she?”

Andrea’s fist collided with the training drone as another drone was knocked back by a shot from her burst rifle. Training drone parts were strewn all about the floor around her. Two more crumbled to pieces from the forces of her attacks. Reaper watched her from the observation level as several more training bots and a Talon assassin rushed her. The Talon assassin leapt at her, wristblades streaking scarlet through the air, but Andrea brought up her rifle in a block, stopping the blades, before wrenching the rifle out from underneath the blades and smacking the assassin hard in the face with the butt of the rifle. He saw Jack in the blue of her eyes and the bridge of her nose, in the way her jaw tightened.

_Beautiful, isn’t she?_

_You’re goddamn beautiful, Reyes,_ He remembered the Omnic Crisis, the air heavy and damp and Jack’s forehead against his own, coming away bloody from the newly carved gashes on his own face.

“Gabriel?” that clear voice cut through the memory and he was present again. Andrea still tossing training bots around like they were little more than toys. 

“What?” said Reaper.

“I said, ‘Beautiful, isn’t she?’” said Moira, looking back out at Andrea. 

“Mm,” Reaper gave a grunt of noncommittal agreement, “So… I take it the council’s not budging on their decision.”

“I questioned the decision,” said Moira, “Provided some alternatives, but they’re sticking with it. Faustine made her offer and he had his chance, I suppose.”

“I’m sorry,” said Reaper.

Moira bit the inside of her lip and looked down. “Her first mission without you as a controller,” she said, her voice somewhat strained, “You must be so proud.”

“I think the council is sending me a message with this mission,” said Reaper, “’Hey in case you were thinking of leaving, we have nanite-tracking tech now and a nanite-and-SEP-Serum enhanced weird…daughter clone of you.’” 

“Which is ridiculous because you’re not thinking of leaving,” said Moira, “But thank you for, once again, making the loss of my son all about you.”

Reaper glanced off. What could he say?  _‘There’s a chance he could live–he’s smart, Overwatch will protect him. Talon could fail,’_ there was no comfort he could give her when any comfort hinged on a failure of Talon’s mission. 

“The tech’s still only a prototype,” he said.

“It will work,” her voice was hollow.

Reaper glanced down. “I told you kids make everything messier,” he muttered.


	46. Dragonback Pt. 2

A draft blew into the hangar of the Talon Croatia base. Reaper watched as a small crew readied the Vaquita, Talon’s small, long-range stealth flight unit. The hems of Reaper’s long coat rippled in the breeze. He glanced over at Andrea– she was just as tall as Maximilien, and even bulkier than him between her SEP serum, tactical gear, and Maximilien’s own sleek suit. He didn’t want to think about how old she was, how old she was  _really._  Moira said the artificial aging process within the amnio tube still took several years, and was slowed even then by the brainwashing process, and she was aged up even older than Aedan. It made his gut wrench. A strike team of four was checking their weapons before heading into the Vaquita themselves, their heads and identies all completely concealed by Talon helmets. Pretty standard six person mission. 

“I hope you understand this tracker represents no small investment of time and money,” said Maximilien as Andrea turned the tracker over in her hands.

“So if I’m not her controller on this mission…” said Reaper, putting a hand on his hip, “Who is?”

“That would be me,” a French-accented voice spoke behind him and Reaper turned around to see a pale girl with champagne blonde bobbed hair donning what appeared to be a Talon tac-gear variation on a chauffeur’s uniform. Her temples were pocked with neuroprosthetics.

“Oh… you,” said Reaper, maybe 75% remembering her, “…Fossie?”

“ _Faustine,_ ” Faustine and Maximilien said at the same time, 

“You’re sending your daughter to watch my daughter,” said Reaper flatly.

“I’m sending my  _protégé_  to watch your  _clone_ , yes,” said Maximilien. He gave a slight pat to Reaper’s shoulder, “Knight and Bishop. Just like us, eh?”

“I don’t play chess,” said Reaper, folding his arms. 

“I could give you a few lessons sometime,” said Faustine with a smile, tugging at her black driving gloves and smiling, she gave a glance over to Andrea, “Knight and Bishop are very effective in the endgame, especially for taking a King.”

Reaper scoffed, “I know enough about chess to know that kid is not a King,” he muttered.

“Certainly not,” said Faustine, “Just a pawn who has no business being on that side of the board.”

Reaper just grunted.

The nanite tracker in Andrea’s hands started beeping suddenly. Andrea turned it on and it projected a small hologram of a globe, with a little red dot blinking in northern Japan.

“Speaking of no business on that side of the board…” said Maximilien, “You have a long flight ahead of you.”

“And you have much work as well.  _Au revoir, Papa,_ we’ll see you when the mission’s over,” Faustine kissed Maximilien on the cheek and Maximilien gave Faustine an affectionate touch under the chin. Andrea looked at Reaper, stood at attention and saluted before boarding the Vaquita.

—

Shirakami-Sanchi forest was quiet. Then again, growing up between Oasis and lab facilities with heavy amounts of  internal security that would fence him out of whole sections, Aedan decided he probably had not walked in enough forests to determine what was a ‘quiet’ forest. There was sound–the wind rifling through leaves, the odd bird call cutting through the air—but there was an eerie tranquility to this place… or it was probably just eerie to him. He watched the Shimadas as they easily walked through the forest paths. Despite a red-eye flight on a drop ship, they kept a pretty mean hiking pace. 

Aedan was the outsider here, as always. If Angela were here, maybe there might be someone to share in the alienation of being a scientific mind on what could only be assumed as a spiritual mission—Mercy hated his guts, he was aware of that much, but it would have seemed less isolating, at least. Aedan watched Rei, easily ambling after her father and uncle as they walked deeper and deeper into the forest. Despite Rei’s teasing, his time on missions with Overwatch and environmental research trips with Mei had made him a bit hardier in the wilderness. 

“So…” Aedan broke the silence with a human voice, “You all… come here often?”

“That is not your concern,” Hanzo said crisply.

“Uncle used to bring me here for ninja training when I was younger,” said Rei, smiling.

“Rei,” Hanzo said her name in warning.

“What?” said Rei, “We can trust him.”

Aedan reddened a little.

“I mean, this isn’t exactly Overwatch-breaking information, anyway,” Rei added, “It was fun! I wore this big, dorky ankle weights and I’d have to chase after him along all these paths and jumping from tree to tree…”

Hanzo huffed.

“I think most of our tree markers from that time are still here,” Genji said, his eyes scanning the light filtering through the leaves above. He sighed a little wistfully, “You were  _so little,_  then.”

“Dad—“ Rei started with an eye-roll.

“You tried  _so hard,_ ” Genji’s fingertips were pressing along his faceplate.

“ _Dad,_ ” Rei’s voice was harsh with exasperation. She looked back at Aedan, beet red. Aedan kind of liked the mental image of a smaller version of Rei jumping from tree limb to tree limb. It seemed like her, anyway.

“Our father trained us in this forest too,” said Hanzo.

“If by ‘training’ you mean, ‘Left us alone for 5 days in the wilderness,’” said Genji, “Which, it turns out, is not a normal parenting thing.”

“According to Angela,” said Hanzo.

“According to most of the Watchpoint,” said Genji.

“Which, as we have discussed, are not a good model on which to determine what is ‘normal,’” said Hanzo.

Aedan gave a glance over to Rei, who was furrowing her brow as her father and uncle bickered. Aedan only shrugged at her. The term ‘normal parenting thing’ gave him some pause—after all, he had known from his very inception that his existence would not be a normal one—exactly how  _abnormal_  it would be he wouldn’t find out until later, but Talon had raised its children with the idea that Talon would change the world, that they would live in Talon’s world—Overwatch, well it wanted to make the world a better place, certainly, but it wasn’t the same vein as Talon. It wasn’t willing to burn down everything to start from scratch. It raised its children to adapt to and understand the world around them as it was. He sort of envied them for that. He, or Rei, or Samir or anyone could raise a question regarding the morality and legality of their actions and it would be considered just as seriously as if they were a senior member like Jack or Ana or McCree. Overwatch was an organization that was constantly facing the mistakes of its past… while Talon’s morality was malleable enough so they didn’t really  _have_  to grow, and thus, didn’t.

“So this forest has… a lot of meaning to the Shimada family, I take it?” said Aedan, looking at Rei’s pained expression and hoping he might take the focus of the conversation off of her and the proper means of raising her.

Both Genji and Hanzo looked over their shoulders at him and he suddenly felt very small.

“You… could say that,” said Hanzo slowly.

“Uncle, it’s where the clan got the dragons,” said Rei.

“He does not have a right to that information!” Hanzo snapped.

“Well he’s  _here_ , so he should know,” said Rei.

“He is merely a medic whose standing within Overwatch is probationary at best!” said Hanzo.

“Well… I told Angela in the early months of the Recall,” Genji said quietly.

Aedan could feel his own face burning at this point. He wasn’t sure how comfortable he was having his relationship with Rei compared to that of Rei’s parents.

Hanzo, apparently thinking the same, looked sharply to Genji. Aedan looked to Rei, who was still hiking along, but with her face buried in her hands at that point.

“The relationship is not comparable,” Hanzo said flatly. Everyone avoided eye-contact with each other for nearly half a mile after that.

“So!” Aedan managed to blurt out after the insufferable silence, looking at Rei, “How the clan got the dragons, huh?”

“Which is a story reserved for those  _within the clan_ ,” said Hanzo, tensely.

“I told Angela,” said Genji.

“Well as I’ve said earlier, you’re married and the relationship is not comparable—“

“And McCree,” said Genji.

Hanzo closed his eyes and inhaled slowly and deeply through his nose before exhaling through his mouth. He opened his mouth to retort to Genji but was cut off as Rei cut in.

“And… maybe people outside of the clan should know the story?” said Rei, “I mean… you both put so much effort into collapsing it…”

“Moira was trying to understand the origin and purpose of the Shimada dragons for years,” said Genji, quietly, “If we were telling Jack or Ana or Pharah, I’m sure the story would be yielded more freely but…”

Aedan’s stomach knotted. Usually any mention of Moira tended to shut down any discussion of  _anything_  near him. As far as Overwatch knew, he could still be her Trojan horse.

“Well I’ll give him the abridged version,” said Rei, putting her hands on her hips and slowing her pace slightly so Aedan could walk alongside her.

“What?” said Aedan.

“What?” said Hanzo.

“So, the whole dragon thing started back with this lady in the Heian period, Reiko Shimada,” said Rei.

“Rei…ko?” said Aedan.

“Yeah, Dad named me after her. ‘New start’ and all that. But anyway she was like…  _super pregnant_  during this hardcore siege on her family’s castle–”

“‘Like super pregnant?’” Hanzo repeated Rei’s words, arching an eyebrow, “The story is well over a thousand years old. I think you owe your namesake a bit better than ‘like super pregnant.’”

“Fine,  _heavy with child,_ ’” Rei imitated Hanzo’s dramatic timbre, “Anyway, during the battle, her Lord husband got killed, and she gave birth the night her family’s enemies finally broke through their defenses, and she named her baby boy Hikaru Shimada. And then her most loyal servant put both her and her newborn into a wheelbarrow and wheeled them as far away as he could from their burning castle until he got an arrow in the neck and she had to continue on foot. And she managed to make it to this forest. And she and her newborn son survived for 5 days here before her baby got this fever, and she thought she was going to lose him, but then she found the shrine of moonlight.”

“The shrine of moonlight?” Aedan arched an eyebrow.

“It sounds better in Japanese,” Hanzo said tersely.

“But the Shrine of Moonlight is where the dragons descended on her all like, ‘I shall protect you and all your bloodline for as long as a Shimada child lives!’ And baby Hikaru miraculously got better, and I guess all Shimada have dragons now…” Rei trailed off, “Except… y’know…”

“Except we’ll find the shrine and get your dragon back from it,” said Genji, slowing enough for her to walk up and meet him, where he tucked her hair back slightly. He had his visor on. Aedan wondered if Genji would still have his visor on if he wasn’t there. It became very clear to Aedan that this was a family affair, that if Mercy wasn’t busy patching Jack together from his latest foray in a battle he was far too old for, that she would be here, not him. Rei’s mother should be here, not him. She rescued Rei from Urdr, not him. Maybe if Mercy had resurrected Rei and not him, maybe Rei would still… Aedan felt his pace slowing, the Shimadas easily maintaining their hike ahead of him. Aedan tried to clear his thoughts. No, he was a medic. He had a place on this mission. He had to see this through, too.

Rei’s voice suddenly cut through his melancholy. “Wait–’ _Find?’”_ she said _,_  “’Find’ as in, you don’t already know where it is?”

“Well Hanzo found it before,” said Genji but Hanzo glanced off.

“Uncle…?” said Rei.

“Well… it was more like it found me,” said Hanzo.

“Oh  _scheisse,_ ” Rei muttered under her breath, “The storm arrow story.”

“Rei, I wouldn’t bring you out here if I didn’t believe there was something in these woods that can help you,” said Hanzo.

“You were bleeding out and delirious!” said Rei, “You said yourself you don’t know if you dreamed it!”

“Wait-wait–back up–Storm arrow story?” said Aedan.

Hanzo and Genji exchanged glances. Genji looked expectantly at Hanzo. Hanzo scoffed. 

“Fine,” he said, “So long as we’re spilling all of our family’s secrets to an ex-Talon clone of a mad scientist–A few years before Rei was born, I was dependent on a weapons supplier for a unique arrow called the scatter arrow. Our meeting point was at the border of this forest. Unfortunately while I was resupplying myself with his product, I learned the hard way that he had sold me out to my family. I was unprepared, and set upon by several assassins. I managed to dispatch them as well as my traitorous supplier, but in doing so, destroyed the resource for my most powerful weapon aside from the dragon. I stumbled through the woods, losing track of time and space–” 

“And you were bleeding out,” said Rei.

“And I was bleeding out,” Hanzo conceded, “I tried to clean out and patch up the worst of my injuries at the river but… ended up passing out into it.”

“If you sit by the river long enough…” Genji quipped but Hanzo rolled his eyes.

“I remember a blue light and a distant voice–I remember the feeling of the dragon dragging my mind back to consciousness…” said Hanzo, “When I came to, I had washed to a riverbank, and all my injuries were healed.” He extended his arm and the blue light of his dragon spiraled around it, “And in that moment I knew, something had awakened in my dragon as well. It felt… brighter, stronger…more present in me than ever before,” he looked back at Rei, “There is something in this forest Rei. Something connected to the dragon. I would not be here otherwise.” 

“So the dragon saved you,” said Rei, furrowing her brows.

“The dragon is  _dependent_  on me, Rei, there had to be something else.”

“Or some _one_  else! What if a hiker just found you and happened to have a biotic cannister on them and they healed you and just… left?”

“A hiker? In the middle of the night? Leaving me in a river where I could still get hypothermia?” said Hanzo, “Seems unusual for someone trying to save someone…”

“Well… you  _are_  kind of heavy,” said Genji, but Hanzo gave him a sharp look and Genji cleared his throat.

“It was the shrine,” said Hanzo, stopping and looking at Rei, “I  _know_  it was.”

Rei pursed her lips, “We’re really scraping the bottom of the barrel for getting the dragon back, aren’t we?” she said quietly.

“Rei–” Genji moved to put a hand on her shoulder but she shrugged it off and picked up her pace.

“Rei…” Hanzo started after her.

“You said you found it when you fell in a river, right?” said Rei, her voice bitter, “We’d better start walking if we’re going to find it. Maybe if I’m lucky I’ll get a head injury on the way and we’ll  _definitely_  find it!”

Hanzo sighed and rubbed his forehead, Genji paused, unable decide whether to catch up with her or give her her space. Aedan did decide. Despite having longer legs than her, he still had to practically jog to catch up with her, far enough away from Genji and Hanzo to be out of earshot, but close enough so that even in the brush and trees, there was still a faint visual.

“Rei–” he spoke after her.

“Don’t,” said Rei.

“I know it doesn’t look certain–”

“You said we’d get it this time!” Rei whirled on her feet at him.

“…I said this time would be different,” said Aedan, glancing off.

Something wet glistened in Rei’s eyes for a second but she bit the inside of her lip and turned away from him. “But you didn’t know,” she said “You  _don’t_  know.” 

“I don’t,” Aedan admitted, “But… I believe it’s different this time.”

Rei’s face dropped. “Believe? Aedan–you’re always going off about science and empiricism and all that stuff. You’re not a ‘believe’ person.”

“And you’re someone whose family has this thousand year old legacy of pulling magical dragons out of thin air! And–look–back at Urdr–I didn’t know I could do what I did. I  _didn’t know._ And look, my Mum, she probably analyzed as much of your dad’s DNA as she could get her mangled hands on, and she  _still_  couldn’t figure out where the dragon came from–How it worked. For me, Fading is like flexing a muscle that… that isn’t there. And bringing someone back that was… It was something inside me–something that was always there that I just had to figure out how to call. And I think the dragon is something similar for you. There’s another element at work here that none of us could understand… not yet… and I think that requires heading off into the unknown for that.”

Rei was silent, staring at him, eyes wet and shining. Aedan hesitantly reached forward and grabbed her hand. “You’re right. I’m not a ‘believe’ person. But I believe in you.” 

Rei looked down at his hand clasped around hers, and then back up to his eyes. Heterochromatic, earnest, searching, always a little anxious. Aedan felt her fingers squeeze around his.

“Aedan–” she started but was interrupted by Hanzo pushing through the brush behind them.

“Rei,” he was saying, “I know the situation seems–Oh–I’m sorry I didn’t mean to–”

Rei’s hand jerked from Aedan’s in a second.

“It’s–it’s nothing,” she stammered, “It’s fine. I’m fine now.” 

“Oh… Well… good,” said Hanzo as Genji pushed through the brush after him.

“Ready to keep going?” Rei forced a smile.

“You were painfully accurate earlier,” said Hanzo, “As you said, we do believe our best bet is looking for a river or similar body of water.”

“Well, I guess we should find it then, shouldn’t we?” said Rei.

Hanzo and Genji gave a nod and the four continued on their way.

Rei looked over her shoulder and mouthed a ‘thank you’ to Aedan, and Aedan gave a small thumbs-up to her.

“What did you say to her?” Genji’s voice was barely audible, even to Aedan, but Aedan just awkwardly shrugged.

“Y’know I… let her know I have a good feeling about this,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck.

—

“Arriving in Tōhoku airspace now,” the Talon pilot said as the Vaquita glided over the ocean.

“Excellent,” said Faustine, sitting primly in the co-pilot’s seat. She extended a hand to Andrea. “If you will,” she said.

Andrea handed over the nanite tracker. Faustine peeled off both of her driving gloves, revealing the mosaics of neuroprosthetics on the backs of her hands. Faustine extended the fingers of her right hand toward the tracker while extending her left hand toward the Vaquita’s GPS on the dash. Andrea tilted her head with some curiousity as vein-like wires slid out from beneath Faustine’s fingernails and threaded themselves over the tracker, and likewise wires from her left hand stretched taut into the dash.

 _“Triangulating new coordinates,”_  said the Vaquita’s AI as the pilot tilted the ship slightly.

“You know you  _could_ just plug it in,” said the pilot.

“Well, as Maximilien said, it’s a highly delicate and expensively produced piece of machinery,” said Faustine, “Should there be any fluctuations on the vaquita, I can insulate it from the surge.”  Faustine’s eyelids fluttered slightly as she looked at the GPS, “Shirakami-Sanchi?” she arched an eyebrow, “You hardly struck me as the outdoorsman, Aedan.”

“Do those hurt?” asked Andrea, watching as Faustine inhaled and wires extending from her fingertips seemed to twitch like veins.

“Nothing I can’t handle,” said Faustine, “Nervous disorder when I was little–you know, pain is in the mind. And the nerves. And sometimes it’s not real. But thank you for your concern.”

“I was only asking in case such modifications might make  _me_  more useful to Talon,” said Andrea, “If the pain distracts from my missions, such modifications are best specialized to you.”

Faustine smiled. “Oh they are definitely best specialized to me,” she said, “Knight,” she motioned with her head toward Andrea, “And Bishop,” she nodded for herself, “We all have our parts to play.”

“Hm,” Andrea gave a nod.

 _“New Coordinates found,”_  the Vaquita’s AI spoke up again,  _“Adjusting course.”_

“I have a good feeling about this,” said Faustine.


	47. Dragonback Pt. 3

The four of them managed to reach the river by the late afternoon and follow it upstream through various foothills and thickets until the sun set. They stopped near a pond, one that had been carved out probably by some Omnic-era blast and flooded. Nature had retaken the area, of course, made it look more natural than it really was, Setting up camp wasn’t too time consuming an affair. Aedan assumed the Shimadas would have a Vishkar Hard-light tent projector or something similar, but instead, they just set up their would-be campfire and their sleeping bags around it, under the stars, well, what would be stars, eventually. They ate a light but satisfying dinner of seasoned tofu, lentil, and chickpea-stuffed onigiri that Genji had apparently adapted from his time in the Shambali, and by the time they had cleaned up the full moon hung in the purple-gray light of dusk. Rei was standing at the edge of the pond, frowning at it, as Genji came up alongside her.

“So,” he said, folding his arms next to her, “How do you want to go about this?”

—

“Anything?” Genji called out as Rei floated in the middle of the pond on her back, wearing a plain navy one-piece.

“Nope,” said Rei, frankly feeling a little ridiculous being the only one in the water.

“Just… try and remember what Zenyatta taught you. Close your eyes, open your mind, take deep breaths, empty yourself of all distractions, all doubts, focus on your breathing, on the sound of the wind in the trees, let yourself–”

“Can you not narrate this?” said Rei.

“Right,” said Genji, “Sorry.” 

Rei closed her eyes and floated on her back for a few more minutes. “Can you guys leave, actually?” she said after a long pause.

“Of course,” said Genji.

“That includes you too, Dad,” said Rei, flatly.

“Oh-of–Right. Of course,” said Genji as he walked off with Hanzo and Aedan to give her space. 

Rei gave a glance back to the shore of the pond to see the three of them weren’t in sight, then took a breath in and closed her eyes.

—

“I’m messing this up,” Genji was pacing back and forth in a clearing a ways away from the pond, “I’m making it worse. I’m putting too much pressure on her—”

“To be fair, in all of our stories of all of our family, we’ve never heard of anything like this happening,” said Hanzo, “We don’t know how to deal with losing a dragon, because no dragon has ever been lost like this before.”

“..Never?” said Aedan, rolling his knuckles against his leg nervously.

Genji and Hanzo looked at Aedan as if they had both forgotten he was there. 

Hanzo frowned but Genji stepped forward. “Well, Rei’s dragon hasn’t really behaved like previous dragons, either,” he said, pacing again, “I mean our leading theory is that Angela’s biotic spinal implants affected how Rei’s dragon would manifest itself when she was pregnant with Rei, but the truth is, we never really know what comes with the dragon’s manifestation. Hanzo’s and my dragons are actually some of the simplest manifestations. According to the stories, other members of the main branch have had dragons that can sense things beyond human perception, make their wielder invisible to the eye and mind, or even control the minds of opponents.”

“But these are just Father’s stories,” said Hanzo. 

“Part of the reason the Shimada Clan’s empire stood so long was because it could do things no one else could do. The reason that it could do those things was the dragons.”

“But you still don’t know what the dragons are,” said Aedan, “Why they are.”

“We’ve tried,” said Genji, “Or at least Shimada before us have tried. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this particular generation of Shimada have been a bit busy fighting Talon and… our own clan. But we’re trying to understand it… as much as we can.”

“But if Rei can’t get it back… we may well never figure it out,” Aedan said quietly.

“I couldn’t imagine losing my dragon,” said Genji, “It… it must feel like being gutted. And I’ve  _been_  gutted.”

“Thanks,” Hanzo said flatly.

“Oh thank  _you,_ ” said Genji, folding his arms.

Aedan just glanced back in the direction of the pond, unable to see anything through the thicket.

—

Rei stared up at the leaves framing the darkening sky, their green fading to dark blue against star-dotted lavender.

“I know you’re in there,” she said very quietly. She shut her eyes. “Please,” she whispered, “Please, please be in there.”

_How did I do it the first time?_  she thought,  _How did it happen when I didn’t even know it was there?_

_“What if I don’t have it?”_  she remembered the smell of Shambali incense and the hum of the processors within the Sanctum.

_“Then that’s fine,”_  she remembered the feeling of her father’s prosthetic hand on her cheek,  _“You’re your mother’s daughter too, and she never needed a dragon to do amazing things.”_

_“You summoned yours sooner–”_ she started, 

_“Because your grandfather pushed me and your uncle much harder than was healthy for any of us,”_  said Genji,  _“No matter what, Rei, you represent a new future for our family–something brighter, kinder. If we have to leave the dragons behind for that future, I’m fine with that.”_

_“I’m not fine with it,”_ Rei muttered.

_“Oh? Why’s that?”_  said Genji.

_“The dragons make us special,”_ Rei said quietly,  _“I know Mom’s special too, but…”_  she fidgeted with her hands, _“But I’m not special like mom. And-and–if I’m supposed to be brighter, and kinder, maybe it’s my job to make the dragon that, too.”_

Her father had smiled at this, his mouth tugging at the scars on his cheek. Rei had glanced down, but she felt her father’s finger’s trail under her chin and lift it slightly so she was facing him,  _“I think, dragon or no dragon, you’re already special. Whatever happens in this sanctum, you’ll be loved just as much as you always have. Are you ready?”_

Rei nodded and Genji left her. She sat down cross-legged and closed her eyes, letting go of her distractions and…

_And then what?_

Rei opened her eyes and she was still floating in that pond, staring up at a starry sky.

_“Some half-gaijin bastard shouldn’t even have the dragon,”_  the tattoo artist had said as the needle beat into her back. It wasn’t a tattoo gun, either. It had to be Tebori, the old way. The needle was being jabbed on the end of a black bamboo stick, the tattoo artist’s hand pressing hard against her back to keep her skin steady. Biotics at least sped up the process. Without them, getting a tattoo of this size and detail should have taken months. Rei remembered her uncle squeezing her hand. Genji couldn’t be there. They could accept a bastard of Hanzo, but there was no telling what they would do if they knew Genji was still alive.

_“You won’t speak of her like that,”_ Hanzo had warned.

_“I’ll speak however I damned please. I may hate the Shimada clan enough to help you with this, but that doesn’t mean I forget what it once stood for,”_  the Tattoo artist dabbed away some of the excess ink. Hours and hours had passed, short biotic-treatment breaks were taken, then more hours, more jabbing, before finally the tattoo artist had said,  _“Dammit.. I think this might be my best work…Hey kid. Make it count. Show me the dragon.”_

Rei had peeled her cheek off of the plastic of the bench she was laying across and looked at Hanzo. 

_“Come on, kid–We’ve been at this for 20 hours,”_ the tattoo artist goaded,  _“You can at least summon it, can you? This isn’t some bullshit where you can walk in and get a pretty chrysanthemum or a Koi–”_

_“The Shimada Dragon is not a parlor trick,”_  Hanzo had interceded.

_“I’d say it’s worth 20 hours of my goddamn life,”_  said the tattoo artist,  _“Come on kid…”_ he paused,  _“You can’t even do it, can you?”_

The words were drying up in Rei’s throat.  _I used to. I used to. I loved it. It was beautiful. It was powerful. It was me._ But instead her mouth just hung open helplessly.

_“That’s enough,”_ Hanzo had said.

_“Figures,”_  the tattoo artist scoffed,  _“Fucking gaijin…”  
_

Rei opened her eyes and she was floating in the pond again. The sounds of night birds and insects bled into her hearing and she squeezed her eyes shut and pushed herself beneath the surface of the water, exhaling through her nose as she did so to keep the water rushing up it. She remembered herself as a little girl, sitting cross-legged in the Shambali sanctum, imagining herself in a vast dark space. The first feelings of something prickling and bright and warm coiling up inside her, an almost dizzy sensation radiating out from her solar plexus, a light ribboning around her arms.

_I know you’re in there,_ she thought furiously,  _I know you’re in there. I know you’re in there. Please come back to me._

_Like flexing a muscle that isn’t there,_ she remembered Aedan’s voice,  _Something that was always there that I just had to figure out how to call._

_Except I could call it before,_ she thought, _Now there’s just a dark and empty space where there once was this light and warmth and power and–oh scheisse I need to breathe._

Rei’s head broke the surface of the pond and she gasped, got a droplet of water in the back of her throat and then coughed, then cursed under her breath. “Stupid pond,” she muttered, swimming to the edge and then wading out.

—

Genji perked up at the sound of a twig snapping, then stood up from the log he was sitting on as Rei pushed through the thicket, her clothes on and her hair dripping wet. 

“Rei–” he started but he read her face in an instant. His shoulders slumped slightly but he closed the distance between himself and his daughter in a few brisk steps, “It’s okay—” he started, moving to put a hand on her shoulder.

“No, Dad, it’s not!” Rei snapped, knocking his hand away, her voice was rippled by near sobs, “It’s not okay!  _I’m_  not okay! I’m–I’m—Something in me is  _broken_ , and–and–and the dragon won’t come as long as it’s like that and I don’t know how to fix it,” She stared at Genji for a few seconds before saying, “Or… or maybe that’s not it either. If–if the dragon didn’t come to broken things, you and Uncle wouldn’t be able to call it either. It just… it  _hates_  me. I–I  _died_ , so it won’t come back to me because it knows with me it could die. I’m not  _worthy_  of it. I’m not  _strong enough_  for it. And–and you keep saying it’ll come back. That it’ll be okay. That I just have to be patient. But I’m empty! I’m  _empty! I can’t do this!! I can’t keep doing this!!_ ” 

“Rei…” Genji started, but Rei just briskly walked away from him, sniffling.

Aedan moved to go after her but Hanzo put a hand on his shoulder. Aedan looked back at Hanzo in protest but there was a steadiness in Hanzo’s expression and Aedan instantly realized that there was nothing he had no idea what he could say to Rei to make things better. 

—

“Zeroing in on the target’s location now,” said the Talon pilot.

“Hold position,” said Faustine, “Circle the target at an eight mile radius with the cloaking on. The trees should give us enough cover, but it’s too early in the evening for us to attack. We’ll take the target later in the night, catch him when he’s sleepy and disoriented.” Faustine leaned back in her seat slightly and looked over to Andrea, who was suiting up with the rest of her strike team, “Sound good to you?”

Andrea looked up from strapping on her combat layers. “You are my controller, aren’t you? You aren’t Reyes, but I will still defer to your decisions.”

“Well we’re partners, as well. You’re the one with 200 years of Mnemosyne-crammed martial knowledge in your head. If you have ideas for potential strategies I’d love to hear them.” 

“Partners…” Andrea repeated.

“Well just because you’re fresh out the amnio-tank doesn’t mean you’re a  _child,_ obviously,” said Faustine.

Andrea blinked a few times and then glanced down as if confused.

“Have I said something that’s bothered or confused you?” asked Faustine.

Andrea shook her head. “I am used to Reyes as my controller. He tends to be more…” Andrea furrowed her brow thoughtfully.

“Controlling?” Faustine smiled.

Andrea nodded. “He… never told me I’m not a child,” she said.

“Well, you share half his DNA and he’s been shown to have a history of emotional compromise” said Faustine with an easy shrug.

“You don’t think I’m a child,” said Andrea, “Despite my artificial aging.”

“Well, the way I see it, we put Omnics out into combat when they’ve been functioning for only a few hours,” said Faustine. She held up her hand, turning it over to show the latticework of neuroprostheses on the back, “There’s never been a large distance between wires and flesh for me. Programming doesn’t make Omnics any less of people, why should we except you from that sentiment?” 

Andrea tilted her head, weighing Faustine’s words. 

“We’re partners here. We listen to each other,” said Faustine. She extended her hand, “Knight and Bishop?”

Andrea stared at Faustine’s hand, not really sure what she was being prompted to do. Faustine waited with her hand extended for a few seconds before grabbing Andrea’s hand, shaking it, and saying, “Knight and Bishop,” again.

“Knight and Bishop,” said Andrea, shaking Faustine’s hand hard enough to jostle her shoulder slightly. 

—

Rei came back to the camp about an hour or so later, eyes puffy and bloodshot. They had the campfire going then, and had taken the time to set out her sleeping mat alongside it. Genji glanced up at her as she came into the light of the fire.

“If you need to talk about it…” his voice was gentle.

Rei shook her head.

“…We can head back to the Watchpoint in the morning,” Genji offered. 

Rei nodded.

“All right,” said Genji. A long pause passed before he said, “It was really brave of you to do this. And I’m  _so proud_  of you for trying. And… and you’re still wonderful and amazing to me. You understand that, right?”

Rei looked up at the, her eyes glistening in the light of the campfire before she rubbed at them and looked down again. She gave a short, shy nod.

The campfire died down to embers, but the words stuck hard in Aedan’s mind.  _“I’m so proud of you for trying.”_ He couldn’t recall anything like that ever being said to him in Talon.

The night carried out in a quiet, muted manner. Aedan wondered if it would be more of a shouting session between Rei, her father and her uncle if he weren’t there, or if it was simply the exhaustion of the trip here and the following hike and the emotional exhaustion of Rei being unable to summon the dragon wiping everyone out.

Conversation was almost nonexistent as the four of them watched the embers of the fire die out. They each silently went to their own sleeping bags, forming a square around the low-burning campfire. Rei was the first one out. With Hanzo and Genji supposedly serving as a buffer between them, and the fire blocking most of her out from his vision. Her features rippled in the waves of heat, but still Aedan studied her face–thick, concerned eyebrows, furrowed against thick eyelashes. He wondered what she dreamt of until sleep swept over him, too.

He dreamt of his own hand pressing against the glass of the amnio-tank, the face of his mother through the haze of biotic amnio-fluid. 

_“I can give him everything I never had,”_  her voice was thick in his mind.

The face of Moira suddenly morphed into McCree as the yellow fluid of the amnio-tank and the glass suddenly phased into a wall of blue light between them.

_“How many more of you are there?”_ McCree’s voice was like a pile of sharp rocks.

The words of Aedan’s own voice seemed muted, half drowned out to postulate and memory.

_“There’s no others of you? You’re sure about that?”_  McCree’s fists suddenly slammed against the blue field.

_“What makes you think you have any right to be here?”_ it was McCree’s voice but Aedan couldn’t recall the words in a memory. The world suddenly plunged into yellow again, his hand against the glass and that plane of glass separating Moira’s hand from his. He glanced down to see the inside of the tank slowly filling with a dense black liquid. He banged a fist against the glass but Moira’s hand only slipped away

_“She’s a monster!”_  the glass shifted to the walls of an elevator, Rei was two feet from him in a yellow sundress, running her hands through her hair as the elevator was filling with the black liquid as well. It was around both their waists at that point,  _“She’s a Talon psycho!”_  

_“So what does that make you?”_ Mercy, Hanzo, and McCree’s voice seemed to overtake Rei, the dense ink around his waist suddenly sloshed away and then Aedan was on his back, desperately crab-walking back from massive form of shadows.

_“Nary a soul to be seen,”_  he could hear his own voice from the mass of shadow. 

And then he was in the hangar. Rei was in his arms. Dead? No–no–no, he couldn’t go through this again—

_“She’s gone, a thaisce,”_  he could hear his mothers voice, but no, he coudn’t accept that.

_“Rei–”_  he shook her,  _“Rei–please–don’t leave me—”_

Rei’s eyes flicked open, glistening ink-black, with black tears running down her face.

_“You’re not alone_ ,” her voice sounded drowned, strangled, wrong as black dripped from her mouth. Her hand clawed at his cheek and he woke with a start. 

He always had a tendency towards nightmares, he figured it was a side effect of Mnemosyne being used on a developing brain, but they hadn’t been that bad in a while. There were a few seconds of soreness and disorientation as he sat up from his sleeping bag and looked around. 

_Camping. Right. Because I love camping,_  he thought, rubbing at his back, bitterly. Why did rocks always seem to find a way to poke up through the sleeping mat and jab him in the spine?

He could hear the soft snores of Hanzo and Genji’s slightly electrically warped breathing, but a shaft of moonlight shined down through a gap in the canopy on Rei’s empty sleeping bag. He stared at it for a few seconds.  _Probably using the bathroom?_  he thought, and then glanced over at the roll of toilet paper resting on top of one of their backpacks,  _Nope._

He blinked a few times then padded his hand around his sleeping bag for his flashlight, but he only managed to find his biotic rig next to it. Well, it would have to do. He unzipped his sleeping bag, then looped the straps over his shoulders and rolled his shoulders, prompting the biotic rig to unfold, the wires winding once around his arms and the biotic nodes clicking open at his palms. They had streamlined the technology for it significantly since his mother’s day, and his own physiology eliminated the need for a massive biotic tank in the back. 

He flicked his wrist and a small yellow sphere of biotics alighted on his palm before he stood up and pulled his trainers on. He stepped off of the sleeping mat and a twig snapped under his foot. Hanzo grunted and Aedan immediately flinched and looked over his shoulder at the still-sleeping 50-something ninja stir, then his eyes flicked to Rei’s sleeping bag. Aedan decided it would probably best if Hanzo or Genji didn’t wake up to both him and Rei gone from their sleeping bags. He faded, decomposing his physical form into smoke and slipping away from the camp. He reformed, then became acutely aware of how sweaty his shirt was from his nightmare, relieved himself in some bushes (albeit awkwardly with one hand holding his biotic light source aloft), then made his way to the pond to clean up a bit. 

He dimmed the biotic sphere off as he knelt at the water’s edge, rinsing his hands off. As his eyes adjusted to the lack of biotic light, he stared at the pond in the moonlight for a bit, the waxing gibbous reflected mirror-like on its surface. The whole ‘outdoors’ thing wasn’t  _so_  bad, he figured, all things considered. He shook his hands off then brushed a bit of the cold water on his forehead and the back of his neck to try and relieve the greasy, clammy feel of his own sweat, then flinched hard as a dark shape broke the surface of the water. A mass of black. He scrambled back but then two pale hands came out of the water alongside the black lump, and parted it. Aedan made out thick eyebrows, and eyelashes. It was Rei, tucking her dark hair away from her face and smoothing the water from her forehead. She hadn’t noticed him. He got up from the pond’s edge as quietly as he could. Well she wanted privacy last time so–

He moved to walk away and another twig snapped beneath his foot.

“Scheisse—!” she splashed the water around herself with a start and her head jerked toward Aedan, “Don’t scare me like that!”

“Sorry, you just… weren’t in your sleeping bag so…” Aedan trailed off, “You’re trying it again.”

“Yes, I’m trying it again. Go back to sleep,” said Rei, turning away from him.

“I mean, I would, but it’s really not safe, swimming alone at night,” said Aedan.

“Well if I get into trouble, maybe the dragon will help me,” said Rei, “Go back to sleep.”

“I’m—I’m sorry did I say something wrong? Is this some kind of ninja ‘I need to do this alone’ thing or—”

“Aedan I’m skinny-dipping,” Rei said flatly.

“Oh god—” Aedan immediately turned around and Rei just snickered.

“It’s fine, I know you didn’t see anything,” she said.

“Well I have no intention of… seeing anything. I—I didn’t set out with the intention of seeing anything, and I’m just going to continue not seeing anything,” Aedan stammered. He paused for a few seconds, “Can I ask why you’re skinny-dipping?”

“Same as I said earlier: Trying it again,” said Rei, “I guess I thought, ‘Maybe I need to humble myself about it.’ Get more… primal or primordial about it, you know? Maybe the dragon’s seeing me with all these modern trappings and preconceptions of self and it’s not having it, so I should just…” she trailed off, “Admittedly it seemed like a much better idea when I was half-asleep.”

Aedan was quiet, his back still to the pond and her. “Um–I–You told me to go, right?”

“Well… I mean if you’re up and out, anyway…” Rei said, “Just… keep not-looking, I’m getting out.” 

Aedan put a hand over his eyes just to be safe as he heard the soft sloshing of water. “Wait–” Aedan said after a few seconds, “So… it didn’t work?”

“Well I guess… when I see myself in relation to the dragon,” Rei toweled herself off, “Like… in my head, I don’t have clothes–and I guess it was stupid and desperate to think, ‘Oh I should get naked’ rather than the more obvious answer which is…” she grunted as she shimmied into her sweatpants, “ _The dragon_  doesn’t see clothes, so it doesn’t even make a difference if I’m naked or not. It’s stupid. I was stupid.” She pulled her ‘Glitchbot Studios LTD’ shirt over her head.

“You’re not stupid,” said Aedan, he snorted. “You’re… probably the bravest person I know.”

“Bravest?” Rei repeated, toweling out her hair.

“Well, I mean, only you would go skinny dipping when literally the only people who could walk in on you for miles around are either your father, your uncle, or me–”

“You?” Rei arched an eyebrow, stepping in front of him and smiling as he still stood there, hand over his eyes.

“You know…  _me,_ ” said Aedan gestured with his free hand.

Rei tilted her head with some smug expectant expression. The silence from her only made Aedan more nervous.

Aedan could feel his ears burning. “I mean–There’s a thing, right? With us? I’m not crazy? There’s this…thing?”

“‘Connection?’” Rei guessed the word.

“Yes–C-connection,” Aedan nervously ran his free hand through his hair– _God,_  he needed a haircut.

Rei glanced down at the ground beneath her feet and stepped forward tentatively, soundless against soft dirt, no crunching of leaves or snapping of sticks. Aedan’s hand was still over his eyes. She could kiss him now, if she wanted to. She kind of wanted to, but she wasn’t sure how fair that would be to him. If she spoke now that would give away how close she was. She leaned forward slightly, catching her own breath so he wouldn’t feel it on his lips before pulling back and thinking better on it, stepping backwards. Then he started talking again.

“I mean—That’s–that’s not what I’m here to talk about–I mean, granted I didn’t really come out here expecting to talk about anything. But–I guess as long as we’re here… I’m sorry.”

“For what?” said Rei.

“For getting your hopes up,” said Aedan, “It wasn’t fair to you. I just… I guess I wanted it to fix things, too.”

“It’s okay,” said Rei, “I… I know I’ve been angry and bitter this whole time but… It really does mean a lot to me to be spending time out here with you and Dad and Uncle…” she trailed off.

“You can come back, you know,” Aedan said quietly, “I mean, dragon or no, you were always… one of the strongest, most quick-thinking, most capable people I’ve ever met. If you’re not in Overwatch because you don’t think you’re good enough without it—”

“I get it,” said Rei, “I don’t know if I’m ready to do that, but… thank you, Aedan.”

“Also I’m sorry for walking in on you skinny-dipping, I swear I didn’t see anything–”

“Aedan… I’m decent,” said Rei.

Aedan brought his hand away from his eyes and he instantly flinched at how close she was.

“…Oh…” he managed.

“What was that you were saying earlier?” Rei leaned in a little closer, “About a connection?” 

“I—” Aedan swallowed hard, “I–I was kind of rambling. You know me. I ramble.”

“Uh-huh…” said Rei, leaning in.

“I should… probably… learn to shut up… once in a while,” said Aedan, tucking a bit of Rei’s wet hair behind her ear.

“Maybe,” said Rei, her own fingertips brushing along his jaw as her other hand took hold on his shoulder. He closed his eyes, stooping his neck slightly to angle his face towards her more. Stupid O’Deorain height. She pushed up slightly onto her tiptoes, felt his breath against her lips and then…

Rei heard a heard a twig snap. She glanced over Aedan’s shoulder to see  smoke amassing. 

“Rei?” Aedan opened his eyes as he realized he was being left hanging but Rei suddenly seized the front of his shirt and tackled him down to damp soil as a ‘K-CHK’ was heard and the tree right behind where they had just been standing shattered to splinters with shotgun fire.

Rei recovered quickly from the dirt, hauling Aedan up to his feet alongside her.

Standing there in the moonlight was a figure clad in the black, white, and red armor of Talon. The sides of her head were shaved and her remaining long dark hair was tied up in a bun. Her face was covered by glowing red-lensed tactical goggles and a black mask with white skeletal teeth painted on it. 

“Subject Six,” she spoke before cocking the shotgun one-handed. 


	48. Dragonback Pt. 4

The crack of shotgun fire echoed through the forest and sent nightbirds fluttering up from their perches in fear.

Both Genji and Hanzo were up instantly with the sound of the shot. “Rei!” Genji said his daughter’s name as a knee-jerk reaction and then looked to her empty sleeping bag.

“Oh no…”

“The clone—Aedan’s gone as well,” said Hanzo, already grabbing his arrow and getting low.

“Oh they’re going to be in so much trouble when we find them,” muttered Genji.

“They’re probably already in trouble now,” said Hanzo. His eyes flicked to the trees in the distance where he could barely make out the red glow of Talon tactical goggles against the darkness of Shirakami-Sanchi.

“Strike team,” said Genji, strapping on Ryū-Ichimonji and his wakizashi.

“Target practice,” said Hanzo, stringing his bow.

Genji’s eyes flicked to the two tanto next to Rei’s sleeping bag.

“Find Rei and get her her weapons,” said Hanzo, “I can keep them more than busy.”

—-

The tall woman in the mask and goggles brought up her shotgun again.

“Okay, I think there’s been some misunderstanding—” Aedan started before fading away just as she fired another blast at him. Rei lunged at her immediately with a cry after she made the shot but the woman turned on her heels and blocked Rei’s flying axe-kick with the barrel of the gun before seizing Rei by the ankle and throwing her hard. Rei smacked hard into a tree, and dropped to the ground with a grunt.

“Rei—!” Aedan moved to go after her but stopped and faded again as the woman fired another blast at him.

“There is no misunderstanding,” said the woman, cocking her shotgun, “You are Subject Six, which means you are a failure, a defector, and a liability of Talon. I’m tasked with your elimination.” She gave a small glance to a beeping object on her hip before turning on her heel and firing again, Aedan ducked down mid-re-materialization as the wood of a tree he was running past shattered and splintered with the shot.

Rei grunted, pushing herself up to her hands and knees. Okay so, Talon girl could really  _hit._ That was something to keep in mind for the future. Rei had to get rid of her gun, then that would let her and Aedan overpower her fairly easily.

Rei glanced up to see tree trunks splintering and leaves being kicked up as Aedan desperately faded away from shot after shot.

“Leave him alone!” Rei rushed at the woman from behind, heading into a slide and pivoting to swipe the mysterious woman’s legs with her own, only to have her own leg phase through black smoke.

“Nanites—” Aedan started as the woman reformed facing Rei.

“So Talon’s making more Reaper knock-offs,” said Rei before rolling out of the way of Andrea’s fist slamming into the ground where her head previously was.

“Are nanites  _supposed_  to make people this strong!?” shouted Rei as she seized the barrel of the shotgun and tried to grapple it away from the woman.

“You think I’d be running away from her like this if I could  _fight like her?”_ said Aedan, leaping up and turning his biotic rig to ‘Sap’ as he tried to headlock the woman from behind while Rei kept her arms busy. Andrea could feel the strength flowing from her nanites. She grunted and, still keeping a hold on her gun, suddenly ran backwards, slamming Aedan hard, back-first into a tree. Rei’s eyes broke up from the gun to Aedan with fear for a moment.

“I’m fine--” Aedan started before being slammed into the tree again, still keeping his hand sapping the life from her, “Get the--” he got slammed into the tree again, “Gun---”

Rei let out a cry and tightened her grip on the gun barrel, shoving it upward and clipping the would-be assassin on the chin on the way up before Rei kneed her hard in the stomach and finally wrenched the gun from her arms, stumbling back several steps and throwing the gun hard into the pond. Rei gave a little huff of relief before the woman let out a snarling cry of frustration that sounded vaguely familiar when muffled by her mask and kicked Rei hard enough in the ribs to send her tumbling across the forest ground.

_“Andrea, your weapon’s indicator light just--”_  Aedan heard a voice in the woman’s earpiece before she snarled.

“I’ve got this!” Andrea snapped before ramming Aedan into the tree one more time. Aedan felt a crunch against his back and knew it was the central node of his biotic rig. It would have been his ribs, otherwise.

“Shi--” he started before Andrea suddenly reached behind herself, seized him by the straps of his biotic rig and threw him over her head, sending him hurtling into Rei who was staggering to her feet after the force of Andrea’s last kick. Rei was knocked flat on her back again by Aedan being thrown into her and they both grunted. 

Rei stumbled to her feet and Aedan had to smack his own wrist a few times as his biotic rig managed to send out a plume of yellow light with the back node still sparking. He couldn’t form an orb to heal them both, but Rei rolled her shoulders and assumed a ready position in front of him, some of her aches from the fight eased.

“Project Orphan,” said Andrea, drawing a tactical knife, “Stand aside.” 

“No,” said Rei.

“Your inactivity since the Urdr incident indicates either mental or physical unfitness for combat,” said Andrea. 

“I think I’m doing pretty okay,” said Rei, she rolled her knuckles slightly, keeping herself between Andrea and Aedan, “Talon messed up your head, didn’t they? Like they tried to do to me.” Something loosened up in Rei’s stance and something softened in her face. What would her mom do? “You don’t have to kill him,” said Rei, “You don’t have to kill for them. They probably hurt you a lot to make you kill for them, but that’s okay. You’re not the first--”

“My head is not ‘messed up,’” said Andrea, “They did not hurt me. They made me to end this fight. To end Overwatch.”

“Oh god... you’re like me,” Aedan’s voice was hushed.

“I’m better than you,” Andrea brought up her tactical knife, “That’s the point.”

She faded and rushed past Rei and Aedan could only fade to escape her in response.

\---

“Feet down,” said Faustine, shooting a glare at the Talon pilot.

The pilot grumbled and brought their feet down from the Vaquita’s dashboard and Faustine turned her attention back to the thermal imaging map of the forest below. 

“Figured the kid wouldn’t be alone,” muttered the pilot, “You sure Soldier Girl can handle it?”

“A miscalculation was made,” said Faustine, watching as a single ‘hostile’ dot managed to keep four ‘friendly’ dots at bay on the thermal imaging, “The target had been working under Zhou for a while,” she gestured vaguely, “’Examining climatologically induced mutations or some such nonsense.’ This is a world heritage site. It was assumed that his presence and any accompaniment he had out here out here would be scientific--not one prepared for combat.” Faustine frowned at a single red dot rushing towards the two red dots engaging Andrea’s icon on the screen. Her brow furrowed.

“Three-on-one hardly seems fair, does it?” she said, putting a hand on the dashboard and letting the wires run out from underneath her fingers, feeding into the controls. She closed her eyes for a moment and opened them again, the ocular nodes of her neuroprostheses making her pupils show up red like in an old polaroid. She looked at the pilot, “Engage weapons systems,” she ordered.

\---

Genji was sprinting towards the pond, Rei’s tantos in one hand. He wasn’t sure if she was at the pond, but he figured it had been a spot of enough frustration for Rei that there weren’t many other places she could be.

_Okay, simple enough. Just reach your daughter. Your daughter who was definitely not off doing inappropriate things with the clone of your wife’s worst nemesis. Just reach your daughter and give her her swords because there are people in this forest trying to kill all of you. This is normal. This is a normal thing and you can worry about the trauma later---_

A hail of bullets suddenly struck the earth in front of Genji, sending up bursts of dirt. “Really!?” he said looking up through the canopy to see a red and black talon vehicle hovering.

\----

“Really,” said Faustine, firing another round on him.

\---

_“Kuso--”_  Genji was running as the bullets shattered through the branches of the trees above him, the Talon vehicle hovering after him. He darted left and right as tree trunks burst into splinters and limbs and bullet-shredded leaves rained down on him from overhead. He could deflect, but with the limited visual on the vehicle itself through the canopy, he could be pumped full of holes while only delivering a fraction of the bullets back to their sender. He had to get higher.

 Genji’s eyes flicked to a tree trunk as he sprinted and suddenly he half-ran-half-climbed up its length, bounding off of a limb to another tree as that tree was pulped by bullets behind him. He darted in a serpentine pattern from branch to branch as fast as he could, many of the limbs being shattered by gunfire behind him until he pushed off hard from one last limb and broke through the top of the canopy in a flurry of leaves. At the apex of his leap, he brought up Rei’s tantos in both hands and deflected the oncoming hail of bullets that greeted him.

On the interior of the Vaquita, Faustine recognized the green visor and the flurry of blades that managed to miraculously meet and deflect the shots from the vaquita’s turrets. 

“Missiles?!” the Talon pilot next to her said, seeing the Vishkar photon shielding shatter off of their windshield with the force of the deflected bullets. Faustine ignored him. Missiles would take too long to load, and what little shielding the vaquita had left couldn’t handle it if he deflected  _those_. She let the vaquita reload another salvo. He had already reached the apex of his leap and was falling, she could pump him full of holes before he hit the ground.

Genji summoned the dragon in a fluid motion, the green light rippling between blade and cybernetic arm and bullet as he deflected in his descent. His eyes flicked to the two guns beneath the vaquita’s sleek short wings. Shuriken sure as hell weren’t going to do much against it. Without a second thought he threw both of Rei’s tantos, in a fan-like motion, with the dragon flaring around both of his arms. He felt three bullets bite into him, one at the hip, one sparking against his prosthetic forearm, and one at that same shoulder. But the dragon dulled the pain and the tantos made impact.  

The vaquita bucked as the guns burst loose from their riggings, tumbling down to the forest below along with Rei’s tantos. And Genji was tumbling too, only barely managing to grab a tree limb to stop his fall. Pain seared up his prosthetic and his other hand went to the wound in his side, no searing pain of an exit wound, but tearing too deep to call it a graze.

“Nngh!” Faustine’s shoulders bunched up in pain but she kept both hands on the dash as the ship restablilized. Her eyes flicked open. “Weapons systems disabled.”

“...does him hurting the ship hurt  _you_ , princess?” the Talon pilot arched an eyebrow at her.

Faustine just shot another glare at him and the pilot suddenly flinched back from his own controls as they sparked at him.

“Jeez.. touchy...” muttered the pilot.

“Andrea,” Faustine put a hand to her ear, “Air artillery is shot. The Vaquita will need to disengage if we want to make evac. Can you still dispatch the target?”

\---

“Yes,” said Andrea, blocking a punch from Rei to her head. The next part of their fight was a dizzying flurry of punches, kicks and grapples. Andrea clearly had advantage of size, strength, and stamina, and training that allowed for some fairly brutal counters, but Rei was faster, and was more inclined to use the environment against her, running up trees and rebounding off of them, dropping down from above. Andrea only lost visual on Rei for a moment in time for Rei to seize her knife-bearing hand, use Andrea’s own momentum to wrench it behind her back, grab the knife and toss it into the bushes. The hard part was keeping Andrea’s focus on her, since Aedan was clearly the actual target here. 

“Come on---” Aedan was rewiring the back node of his biotic rig, trying to get it to function close to properly again. He strapped it back onto his back when Andrea dissolved into smoke away from Rei and rushed him.

“Shit--!” he faded away from her and Rei jumped her from behind, catching her in a headlock as she came out of her wraith form. Andrea looked at Aedan only to get a face-full of healthsap from Aedan’s biotic rig.

“Yes!” Aedan shouted out of reflex, well aware that any celebration was premature and frankly just thrilled he could get it working again. 

Andrea clawed and flailed with Rei on her back. She couldn’t go into Wraith form with Rei keeping that much pressure on her neck because her body was starving for oxygen and Wraith form was really only possible when the body had a healthy air supply, so she suddenly leapt backwards and body-slammed Rei back-first on the ground, the shock of the impact forcing Rei’s arms loose and letting her get a breath in to fade away from her and put some distance between them.

“You’ve maintained some competence,” said Andrea regaining her breath and watching Rei get back up to her feet, “Despite two years of non-combat.”

“Stunt,” said Rei with a shrug, “This is the first time in two years I’ve been able to punch someone  _for real._ And I can’t tell you how bad I’ve wanted to punch something this whole trip.”

Rei rushed toward Andrea but found herself leaping through smoke, she turned in mid-air to see Andrea’s fist hurtling toward her, brought up her forearms to block it as Aedan flanked Andrea with a biotic orb and the grip of his biotic rig’s healthsap fixed on Andrea. 

“I’ve got this! Get somewhere safe!” Rei shouted at him.

“I’m not leaving you with a Reaper Clone!” Aedan snapped back.

 Andrea swung at him and he ducked out of the way, trying to keep as much distance as he could while still sapping Andrea’s energy. The level of endurance on her was virtually  _inhuman._  

_Like Reaper would be if he weren’t falling apart,_  thought Aedan.

The biotic rig was slowing Andrea down though, Rei could keep the pressure on her with blow after blow while Aedan whittled down her stamina. They had this. They actually had this.

“Rei--!” Genji stumbled through the brush to see both Rei and Aedan engaged with a dark-haired woman in Talon gear. The skirmish between both Rei and Andrea paused only briefly as they looked at him, and thankfully in those fractions of a second Rei was able to easily distinguish  _“Dad: Not a threat”_  and suddenly roundhouse kick Andrea hard in the face, cracking her mask and stunning her hard enough to knock her onto her side with a grunt.

“You’re bleeding,” said Aedan.

“Oh?” Genji glanced down to see the graze in his side.

“Dad!” Rei rushed over and nearly hugged him but instead quickly turned around to keep an eye on Andrea. Andrea stirred on the ground, rubbing at her face. Half of her mask fell off and she peeled off the other half from her cheek with a grunt before pushing off the ground, pulling off her now-cracked goggles and standing at full height to look at all three of them while gripping her side.

“She’s like me,” Aedan was stammering as he used his biotic rig to heal Genji, “Amnio-tank. Made, not born.”

Something tightened in Genji’s stomach as he looked at the woman in the moonlight. Furrowed brow, large, tired eyes, medium brown skin, thin lips and a strong jaw. For a brief second, he was back in the factory in Volskaya, well before Rei was born, seeing Angela bleeding on the ground amid the shards of a bone-white mask as a figure in a dark hood looked at him.

“Reyes,” the name fell out of him but that didn’t feel right either. Her eyes were wrong. Steely blue, not soft and inquisitive and silvery like Angela’s but hard, calm to the point of cold.

“Wait--so the Reaper clone’s a reaper  _clone?_ ” said Rei.

“...Not just Reaper,” said Genji, handing her his wakizashi as he drew Ryū Ichimonji from his back. 

Rei took the wakizashi and assumed a ready position, Aedan noted that the wound in Genji’s side had stopped bleeding with the biotics and then extended his hands toward Andrea. 

Andrea’s eyes flicked across the three of them. She took a sharp inhale from her nostrils and suddenly disappeared in a puff of smoke.

“Kuso,” Genji swore, turning on his heel, listening for any sound from the bushes, “I really hate that shadow step.”

“Keep close to Aedan,” said Rei, as they backed toward the pond for better lighting, “He’s the one she’s after.”

A short ways away, Andrea rematerialized hidden in a thicket and took a knee, trying to catch her breath. She brought a finger to her ear.

“Controller. Where’s my backup?” Andrea said quietly.

_“Two dead from arrows, and I’ve got a pretty good mind as to who fired them,”_ Faustine spoke in her ear,  _“The other four pinned down and attempting to lay down cover fire to get to you.”_

“That’s unacceptable,” said Andrea.

  _“ _Andrea, this strike team was put together to deal with scientists, not Shimadas._  If we had known Hanzo _alone _was in these woods we would have sent a hell of a lot more than a strike team of six! I’ve put a pickup point for Evac on your HUD. We’re scrubbing the mission.”_

“No,” said Andrea.

_“I’m not permitting you to engage them further. As controller I’m ordering you to--”_

Andrea clicked her comm off. “I don’t fail,” she said flatly. She rifled at her belt and pulled off a small object. No gun, no time to find the tactical knife. This was all she had left. She had to make it count. She took another deep breath and phased into Wraith form.

Genji and Rei stayed close to Aedan at the edge of the pond.

“Where’s Uncle?” said Rei, keeping the wakizashi at the ready.

“Holding back the rest of the strike team,” said Genji. 

“This is my fault,” said Aedan, “They’re here because of me.”

“We’re lucky it’s you they’re here for, if they’re here at all,” said Genji, “If they were here for me or Hanzo, it would probably be a lot worse.”

“I don’t know if I should be insulted by that,” said Aedan.

“There are assassination attempts on Overwatch members all the time! If anything, this means you’re definitely part of the team now!” said Genji.

“Dad!” Rei said, irritated.

“Look, when you’ve been doing this as long as me, you have to find the silver--”

Something small hit the ground in front of the three of them. It was about the size of an apple and beeping rapidly.

“...linings.” said Genji.

 Aedan faded. Genji ran. Rei leapt for the pond. The grenade exploded and two of them were sent flying.

\---

Rei felt herself hit the water, but the sensation of wetness itself was muted and dulled by the daze from the explosion. The urge to breathe was briefly overridden by the shock going through her whole body, and further dulled by the mammalian diving reflex. There was pain on pain on pain. 

_Wake up. Wake up, you stupid useless-- They’re in trouble. They’re all here because you wanted your stupid dragon back and they’re in trouble._

She felt herself sinking beneath the water, her eyes opened to search for the moonlight at the surface, and in the blur of dark water, she found a distant bluish white light. Feeling her lungs aching for air, she willed energy back into her aching limbs, weakly kicking her legs and clawing her arms toward that bluish white light. After a few seconds of swimming, she realized she should have broken the surface by now, and then her eyes flicked toward a silvery glint of metal. It was her father’s wakizashi, floating in the direction she was swimming.

But it was metal. It shouldn’t be floating.

...It wasn’t floating.

She turned her head towards the light source she was swimming toward, then turned around to see the moon distorted by the ripples of the surface, then turned around again to see a bluish white light beneath her.

She realized she wasn’t swimming toward the moonlight. Not the moonlight at the surface, anyway.

_“Oh,”_  she thought, seeing the light below.

\--

Aedan rematerialized to catch his breath, then looked and saw Genji flat on the ground about 10 feet away.

“No--” his breath caught in his throat, and then he looked at the still-rippling pond, some bubbles breaking the surface. “Rei!” He moved to dive in but he was suddenly clotheslined hard by Andrea. 

He faded out of her grip and got a few seconds of healthsapping in with his biotic rig before she closed the distance between them again. He had to fight. Heel palm strike to stun--Okay she caught that. Go for the shins--Okay she just swept his legs out from underneath him. He faded to regain his footing and disorient her briefly, managed to elbow her hard in the side before she caught him in a hard arm lock and brought a brutal elbow strike down on his shoulder blade. He felt a rib crack and the wind get knocked out of him. but he faded backwards between her legs and dealt a kick to her side. Rather than making contact with her though, he ended up smashing what looked like an old GPS at her hip. She let out a furious cry, seized him by the ankle and swung him hard. He managed to fade again before making impact with the tree she threw him at. Still a cloud of nanites, he moved to rush towards the pond again. He had to get Rei out of there-- but then suddenly Andrea went into Wraith form and full-on tackled him, nanite against nanite, a wraith against a cloud, and Aedan was forced to reform. She didn’t waste any time. She caught him by the throat and slammed him against the tree.

Andrea tilted her head at him as he choked and struggled under her grip. “You’ve never had a problem you couldn’t fade from, have you?” she said quietly, “It was cruel of O’Deorain to make you feel fear.”

He desperately clawed out a hand for her face, but she caught his wrist and gripped it hard.  She was only applying so much pressure with her thumb, he knew, she could snap it.

“You’re... scared... too,” Aedan managed through gritted teeth. Andrea’s eyes flicked up from his flailing legs to his face, nanite secretions running black from his eyes and one of his nostrils, the nanites in his body struggling to repair him. 

“Psy-ops don’t work on me,” said Andrea flatly.

“You’re scared of what I  _mean,_ ” said Aedan. She released his wrist and his hand instinctively went to hers on his throat, still trying to pry at her fingers, “ _I_  mean they can make a better you. They can make a better you and she’ll get rid of you. Like you’re getting rid of me.” Andrea squeezed harder at his neck at his words, her face contorting with a dull rage that was only barely tamped back by Talon’s brainwashing. Aedan coughed, feeling his vision dim and swim. “Neither of us are ever going to be good enough,” he choked, “Neither of us are ever going to be real.” A fierce light flickered in his eyes, even as his voice was closing off in his throat, “But I stopped letting them tell me what ‘real’ was. And that terrifies--”

Andrea let her free arm turn to smoke and suddenly plunged it into his chest, the strain of partially decomposing herself causing her grip on his throat to loosen. He made a choked sucking sound as he glanced down and looked at her arm phased into his chest, he was straining too hard to breathe to fade.

“You talk too much,” said Andrea, before rematerializing her arm.

Aedan felt the bones of his ribs buckle and crack in an instant. He felt his lungs rip, his eyes were wide as Andrea ripped her arm out of him, covered in black and red. He slumped to the ground. Every nanite in him was screaming, struggling with the shock. Black dripped down from his eyes, his nose, his mouth. He coughed up black nanites, feeling like he was drowning. Every cell in him was an aggressive survivor, and every cell was panicking as they sensed death approaching all of them like an inescapable tidal wave. 

Genji’s mind was straining against unconsciousness, a dark flurry of memories and images trying to make sense of the situation and force his will back into his limbs.  _Rei--Sunshine. The blast--Not London. It’s not London again. She’s here. Can’t lose her again. Angela, I promise you, we won’t lose her again---Get up. Get up. Get up. Get--_

Genji felt a warm sensation wrapping around his arm, spreading to his shoulder, the countless nattering pains keeping his body down giving way to warmth and a low chiming sound. He managed to open his eyes to see ribbons of yellow light wrapping around his arm. Biotics? “Angela...?” he slurred, his voice muffled into the dirt before he lifted his head to see Rei, sopping wet, her hair floating as if she were still underwater, looking down at him, his wakizashi gripped in her hand. Her eyes were yellow light. The dragon coiled around her torso, its foreclaws on her shoulder as it snarled, lighting up the forest in gold light. Rei broke her sight away from Genji to look at Andrea, staring at her, to look at Aedan, a bloody hole in his chest, slumped against the tree, coughing up nanite secretions and blood.

“You’ve got this,” said Genji, “Go help him.”

Andrea only just barely turned on her heel to look at her when she caught a dragon-wrapped fist to the face and then felt something scorch across her torso. A blade encased in yellow light. The force of the blow knocked her right off of her feet and sent her bouncing across the forest floor. several feet away from the tree where Aedan was slumped. Andrea stumbled to her hands and knees then looked down, put a hand to her torso, and brought it back wet and red. A deep diagonal gash ran from the bottom left side of her ribcage to her right shoulder. Rei was still walking toward her, wakizashi gripped in her hand, dragon roiling around her shoulders. Eyes were glowing yellow. Inhuman. Andrea stumbled to her feet.

“Go,” said Rei.

Andrea was frozen in the spot, staring as the dragon roiled around Rei and Rei assumed a combative position with the wakizashi. She gave another bewildered glance down to the wound across her torso, still amazed that this girl got that kind of hit in.

_“GO!”_  Rei cried out and the dragon roared on her shoulder at the same time, yellow light flaring off of them. Andrea’s eyes flicked past her. The target was damaged enough. There was no saving him. She disappeared in a column of smoke. Rei turned around and rushed back to Aedan as Genji kept close watch in case Andrea returned.

\---

Andrea reformed much further away, breathing hard. It was harder to enter in and out of wraith form with an injury like this. She was still bleeding. She huffed and brought a finger to her ear, turning her comm back on.

_“THERE YOU ARE!”_ Faustine barked in her ear,  _“YOU HAVE SOME NERVE CUTTING ME OUT AND IGNORING A DIRECT ORD--Oh god your vitals.”  
_

“I need a biotic drop,” said Andrea.

_“You need an evac and an on-base medic,”_  said Faustine.

“There are still hostiles,” said Andrea.

_“Which are not your mission,”_  said Faustine.

“I can still---” Andrea started.

_“Andrea, you represent entirely too much of Talon’s time, resources, and money to throw yourself away in a fight we weren’t properly equipped for to begin with,”_ said Faustine.

“Talon won’t replace me because I’m not good enough?” Andrea’s voice was quiet.

_“Who in the hell gave you that idea!?”_ Faustine sounded insulted,  _“I said we were partners, didn’t I!? Do you think I would let that happen!?”_

Andrea heard a humming overhead and looked up to see the Vaquita hovering above the canopy overhead. A cable ladder dropped down from it, with Faustine holding onto it a few rungs from the bottom. It was the first time Andrea ever found herself looking  _up_  at Faustine. 

“Come on soldier,” said Faustine, bringing a hand up under Andrea’s chin before climbing up the ladder, “We’re going home.”

Andrea climbed up after her.

\----

“Aedan?” Rei propped Aedan up slightly and flinched back at the gush of blood and nanites that was rushing from the wound in his chest. He had stopped coughing. 

“It’s okay,” Rei’s voice was shaking as she put a hand over the wound, “It heals--Remember? I told you it heals--” she closed her eyes and focused, the dragon spiraling around her arm as a light emanated from her palm. “It’s okay,” she said, trying to convince herself as bones knit back together and lungs closed back up. Rei opened her eyes and looked down to see a patch of exposed paile skin beneath a blood-stained fist-sized hole in his shirt at the center of his chest. She looked back up at Aedan’s face. His eyes were closed. He wasn’t breathing.

“Aedan?” Rei wiped some of the blood and nanites from beneath his mouth and nose. He didn’t respond.

“Hey, come on,” Rei whispered, pressing her forehead against his, “Stay with me, please.”

He was still and clammy against her. She pulled away slightly, staring at his face, streaked black and red with blood and nanites.

“Rei...” Genji spoke gently.

“No,” Rei said stiffly, her glowing yellow eyes glittering with tears, “No, he’s not--He can’t...” Something shuddered in her chest and she suddenly started shaking him. “You can’t! Aedan, you can’t! You saved me so I have to save you! I have to save you, you jerk! That’s how it works! That’s how it--!”

Aedan suddenly spasmed and coughed, splattering her in black, then coughed a few times more, black liquid running down his chin. His head lolled forward for a few seconds before he brought it up, hair hanging in his face. He really did need a haircut. She pushed his hair back and supported his head slightly as he rasped a few breaths.

“R-Rei?” his eyes opened at her. He brought up a hand to the side of her face his fingers trailing against her dark hair, “You’re... all glowy... did we win? Or... are we both dea--”

Rei cupped her hands to his face and kissed him, hard. He tasted metallic. 

His eyes flicked wide at the feeling of her lips on his, then slowly closed. His limbs felt so weak it was all he could do to put his hand on her shoulder to keep himself steadied as she kissed him. She broke away and traced her fingers down the side of his face.

“It’s okay,” she said, hugging him close again, “You’re okay.”

“You got it back...” Aedan’s voice was muffled into her shoulder.

“Yeah...” said Rei, the yellow lights fading off of her, “Yeah, I got it back.”


	49. Dragonback Pt. 5

One of the things they never tell you when you become a father is that, for the sake of both you and your child’s growing sense of personal privacy, you have to become good at avoiding looking at things. You aren’t really aware of this until they’re a teenager, mind you. “No, I didn’t see that book fall out of your backpack.” “No, I didn’t see what screen you were on before you minimized it.” “No I didn’t see the 12 seconds of furious making out as I pulled the car up to pick you up from Amnesty Club.” Seeing Rei grow up, these were things Genji became very aware of. As soon as Aedan came coughing and muttering back into consciousness and Rei cupped her hands to his cheeks, Genji looked off with all the quickness ninja and cyborg reflexes could afford him as his daughter launched her face at the clone of his wife’s worst rival. Genji glanced back briefly, saw they weren’t finished, looked off again for another few seconds, then saw that they were holding each other tightly. His shoulders relaxed slightly for all of two seconds, before both he and Rei became acutely aware of the same thing.

“Hanzo--” Genji started, pivoting on his heel.

Rei perked up slightly from where she was kneeling over Aedan.

Almost on cue, there was a rustling in the bushes and Hanzo burst through a thicket, buckling over to catch his breath.

“They aren’t after us! They’re after the clone!” he blurted out before anyone could ask if he was alright. 

“Hanzo--” Genji stepped up to him, “It’s fine. We’re okay.”

His eyes flicked across the three of them, still panting from his sprint. “Talon attacked you as well?”

“Some kind of combat airship for me,” said Genji. He glanced at Rei and Aedan, “As for them...”

“There was a Reaper clone---Well not really a full clone of him since she was a girl....” said Rei.

“And her eyes were off,” said Genji.

“She collapsed my ribcage,” said Aedan.

Hanzo looked at Aedan.

“I... got better,” said Aedan.

“Are  _you_  okay?” said Rei, walking up to him.

“Some foot soldiers. Nothing I couldn’t handle. I only managed to interrogate one while the rest ran off but... clearly I should have been getting back to you,” said Hanzo.

“We’re okay,” said Rei, smiling a little as she hugged him tightly. Hanzo touched a hand to her still-damp hair and gave her head a pat. Rei pulled back and Hanzo’s brows raised slightly.

“You’ve got black on you,” said Hanzo.

“Hm?” Rei glanced down at the black splatters Aedan had coughed onto her shirt. “Oh--Yeah, that’s just..” she brushed at the front of her shirt, “It’s nothing.”

“No, I mean you’ve got black...” Hanzo trailed off and pointed at his own mouth.

Rei brushed the back of her hand against her lips and saw a dark smudge of nanite secretions. “Oh--Oh that’s just... that’s... um...” Rei furiously wiped at her mouth while Hanzo glanced past her shoulder and made eye-contact with Aedan, who was struggling to his feet while bracing a hand against the tree, his own chin still black from nanites.

“Rei got the dragon back! Isn’t that good news!?” Genji suddenly, and with no small amount of desperation, cut in. 

Hanzo broke his eyes away from Aedan. “What?” He looked at Rei, “When? How?”

“I was hurt, and I was in the water, like you were,” said Rei, “And then...” she trailed off, “There was... this light? And...” Rei looked back at the pond, then broke away from Hanzo, briskly walked over and started sloshing in to the water of the pond.

“Rei!” Genji called after her, but she was already waist-deep when she dipped under-water. “Just like her mother...” Genji muttered.

The surface of the pond was still for a few seconds when Rei suddenly broke the surface with a gasp.

“Dammit!” she smacked the surface of the water with a frustrated splash, “It was there! I swear it was there! And it was all glowy!” She swam back to the edge of the pond. and wrung out her hair and shirt. 

“The same happened to me when I received my storm arrows,” said Hanzo, “I probably searched up and down the rivers and ponds for days, but to no avail.”

“So we’re no closer to figuring out what the dragon actually is,” said Rei, shivering a little, “All we have to go on is a stupid weird glowy blue light and--” She cut herself off.

“...and?” Genji tilted his head at her.

“And we need to get back to the watchpoint,” said Rei, “I... I have an idea, and I’m not sure if I’m crazy or not.”

“I’m with her,” said Aedan, his voice woozy, “If we want to find out more about the Reaper clone, we should get back. If I can get to the lab fast enough, I might be able to isolate her DNA from any spare nanites she left in my body.”

“...so you smeared bits of yourself on Rei, and there’s bits of a reaper clone in you,” said Hanzo, flatly.

“I didn’t  _smear_  anythi--” Aedan started.

“You know what? I’m just going to get back to the campsite and activate the comm beacon. Rei is right, we should get back home,” said Genji.

\----

They stayed close to camp and one of them kept watch for the next few hours until the evac arrived. Rei thankfully had a spare change of clothes so she didn’t have to spend all the time waiting sopping wet. Aedan was still clearly exhausted by the harrowing events, and he no doubt got the worst of the fight, but Rei stayed by his side as he slept and she kept watch. She saw the light of the sky tinge pink through the leaves of the trees as the Orca arrived. 

“Thought you lot were the outdoorsy ones!” Tracer called down cheerfully as she lowered a ladder from the dropship. Aedan was the first to climb up. “Most of you at least,” she said, as Aedan took his seat and the Shimadas climbed up after him. She grinned at Rei, “Good to see you again, Sunshine.”

“Good to... see you too...” Rei started as she pulled herself up into the dropship, but then her eyes trailed down to the chronal accelerator on Tracer’s chest.

A few seconds passed and Tracer cleared her throat. “You all right, love?”

Rei seemed to snap out of a trance. “What? Yeah--I just need to sit down.” She took her seat as Genji, and then Hanzo got up after her.

“Let me guess,” said Tracer, “You’re in for a horrifically long debriefing when you get back.”

“Oh I wouldn’t say horrifically,” said Genji, “...terribly, maybe. Harrowingly...Horrific if it’s Jack doing the debriefing.” 

It was another long flight back to Gibraltar. Aedan took advantage of the on-ship medkit to extract some blood and nanite samples from himself before, as he put it, his body eliminated all of Andrea’s presence. There was a certain unnerving efficiency with the way he stuck needles in his arm. Rei wondered what kind of tests Talon put him through before he defected. She wondered how many of those tests he had been taught to conduct himself.

Rei gave a glance back to her father and uncle sleeping off the fatigue from the fight before glancing back to Aedan, gingerly setting vials of his own blood down in their little case. 

Aedan’s eyes flicked up at her as she watched him. “You should be resting,” he said quietly.

“So should you,” said Rei.

“I will, eventually,” said Aedan, looking out the window of the dropship, “Just... a lot to think about.”

“When is that ever not the case with you?” said Rei, pushing out of her seat and stepping across the dropship to take a spare seat next to him.

“Look they cloned Reyes, and as far as I know, the woman who just collapsed my ribcage is the closest thing I’ll ever have to a sister. It’s... a lot to deal with.”

Rei huffed. “She is not your sister. Siblings don’t...” Rei gave a glance to her father and uncle slumped over sleeping in their seats and cleared her throat, “You don’t have to think of her as your sister,” she corrected herself.

“I know it’s just... amnio-tank. It’s isolating. I mean... it took my mum five tries to make me. I suppose it was egotistical to assume they wouldn’t keep trying after me...” Aedan pushed his hair back, “Then again, I suppose I was my mother’s project. This one... she... she’s pure Talon.” He glanced down at the small case of the two vials and set it aside. He huffed and then looked at her, “I shouldn’t be fixating on this--We should be happy for  _you._  You got the dragon back.”

“Aedan--” Rei started, “With what we’ve just been through...” she reached up and touched a hand over the point where she had healed his ribcage.

Aedan just clasped his hand over hers, letting her feel his heart beat. “We’re safe now,” he said quietly.

“We’re safe _for_  now,” said Rei.

“Then we’ll keep watching each other’s backs,” said Aedan, giving her hand a slight squeeze.

Rei’s brow crinkled a little, but she smiled. “Yeah... we’ll watch each other’s backs,” she said, softly. Aedan let her hand slip back to her and she leaned back in her seat, closing her eyes. Aedan closed his eyes as well for a few moments, but despite all the exhaustion in his system, his eyes flicked open and he glanced over at Rei, all thick eyelashes and feathery flicks of brownish-black hair. He glanced back at Genji and Hanzo, slumped asleep together, and then back at Rei.

“Rei?” he spoke her name softly.

“Mm?” she opened one eye at him.

“I want to ask you something, and I figure I should ask you it now before we get into the whole maelstrom of debriefing and lab work back on the watchpoint,” he nodded his head in Genji and Hanzo’s direction, “And while we have a moment to ourselves.”

“Always a lot to think about with you, huh?” said Rei.

“Always,” said Aedan.

“Okay, shoot,” said Rei.

“Right. So umm.. that kiss back there in the forest,” Aedan fidgeted a little, “Was that an ‘I love you’ kiss or was it a ‘Oh you nearly died and I’m very emotional because I got my weird mystical dragon back’ kiss?”

“Excuse me?” there was a laugh in Rei’s voice.

“I’m giving you an out,” Aedan smiled a little, “Because if you thought I followed you around like a lost puppy  _before,_ oh, believe me, Rei Shimada-Ziegler, I’m going to be  _insufferable_  now.”

Rei grinned and ruffled his hair. “It was an ‘I love you kiss,’ obviously. I mean... yeah I was freaking out because I thought I lost you for a few seconds there but...Yeah. I love you,” she huffed and played with his hair a little, smiling, “Aren’t you supposed to be the super-genius here?”

“Scientists are known to have trouble understanding the miraculous,” said Aedan.

Rei snickered and rolled her eyes hard.

“What, was that bad?” said Aedan.

“It was terrible, I think that’s why I loved it,” said Rei, weaving her fingers between his. He glanced down at their interlaced fingers, then brought up her hand and kissed her knuckles.

“Try to get some sleep,” she said, leaning over and kissing him on the eyebrow.

“I will,” he said quietly as they both settled back into their seats. He watched as she closed her eyes, her head slumping a little, and he smiled and leaned back as well, letting the exhaustion wash over him like a blanket.

He didn’t have any nightmares for the flight back to Gibraltar.

\---

“You can’t keep doing this, Jack,” it was the early evening on the watchpoint and Mercy was frowning over several x-rays of Jack’s hips and remaining foot. 

“The second I stopped going on missions and stuck myself behind a desk was the second everything started going wrong,” muttered Jack.

“Another blow like on the last mission and you could be wheel-chair bound for the rest of your life,” said Mercy.

“We’ve been able to update Genji’s prosthetics over the years...” Jack started.

“Let me rephrase that-- _I_  can’t let you keep doing this. As a doctor. As a  _good person._  Going on missions with the intensity you have is destroying your body. It’s a miracle the SEP serum is holding you together the way it is but--” she went over to her laptop and scrolled through several endocrine screening results with a furrowed brow, “You can’t keep straining it like this.”

“And what, let one of the kids handle it? This fight was supposed to be done before any of them came into the picture!” snapped Jack, “You  _saw_  what happened to your daughter when Talon---!” Jack caught himself as he looked up at Mercy’s face. 

Mercy pursed her lips for a few seconds before taking a calming breath. “Jack--you still have so much you can contribute to the team without going on missions,” she inhaled, “And...” her breath hitched slightly, “And Rei’s been able to build a life for herself without the dragon.” 

“Talon’s just going to keep--” Jack started.

“Don’t,” Mercy’s voice was stiff, she took a deep breath, “I know you have a lot at stake in this fight,” she said, pushing her hair back, “And I know we’re all emotionally compromised here--we’re here  _because_  of that---but you have to think about how much this is about  _your_  pain and  _your_  pride and how much of this is about getting the job done.”

Jack stared at her for a few seconds. “...It’s my mess,” he said, after a few beats.

“We’ve made it our mess, too,” said Mercy.

Jack folded his arms in thought then gave a glance to the x-rays. “As I am...” he said quietly, “How many more do you think I have left in me?”

“This isn’t a question of how man--” 

“Doctor Ziegler?” Athena’s voice chimed over the room’s speakers.

“Not now, Athena,” said Mercy, rubbing her forehead.

“But you told me to--”

“It can wait,” said Mercy, “I’m with a patient.”

“Understood,” said Athena and the speakers blipped off.

Mercy turned back to Jack. “Sorry--What was I--Right. It’s not a question of how many missions you have left, Jack, it’s a matter of doing what’s best for--”

A blue portal suddenly opened up and a tall, lean, medium brown-skinned boy stumbled through and Mercy just about jumped a foot in the air.

“Doctor Ziegler!” Samir blurted out as the portal closed behind him.

“Samir, what did I tell you about teleporting into the infirmary? There has to be some privacy for---”

“They’re back!” Samir blurted out.

“What?” said Mercy.

“You said to let you know as soon as their dropship entered Watchpoint airspace. Genji and the others, Rei, Aedan---They’re back.”

Mercy’s eyes widened. She looked back at Jack. “I--We--” she started.

“I’m too old. I shouldn’t go on missions anymore. I’m stubborn. I got the gist of your prognosis,” said Jack, “I’ll need their debrief, too. Let’s go.”

Mercy huffed a little but then Samir opened up a portal next to her with a flick of his hard-light projector-clad wrist. He gave a small salute and a “Sir,” to Jack before stepping through. Mercy stepped through after him and in a soft ‘vworp’ sound she was out on the watchpoint tarmac with Jack stepping through after her. She looked over her shoulder to see the other kids were there--Rajeev, Marti, and Jaime. Samir took his place next to his twin and they all turned their attention to the van-like contoured boxy shape of the dropship touching down to the tarmac. 

“Heckuva welcoming party,” Mercy glanced over her other shoulder to see McCree walking in off of the watchpoint shooting range. He looked at Mercy. “Think she’ll stay this time?”

Mercy pushed her hair back. “That’s not fair to ask her,” she said, quietly, only barely audible over the hum of the dropship.

The door slid open with a wheeze of depressurizing, and Rei was the first to emerge with Aedan right behind her. She made eye contact with Mercy and her eyes lit up. She stepped out of the dropship and both she and Aedan were both instantly hauled off their feet in a tight hug from Rajeev, then immediately swarmed by the other kids, including Marti, who was trying to break the whole thing up so that Rei could talk to her Mom but finding herself lost in a wash of questions for Rei. Mercy couldn’t blame them, really, it had been months since Rei was last on the Watchpoint. Mercy watched as Hanzo exited the dropship as well, managed to sidestep the swarm of Rei’s peers, gave her a nod and a gentle clap on the shoulder before Jesse took advantage of his jet-lag to catch him in an embrace and whirl him into a kiss. Mercy smiled before glancing back at Rei, still being swarmed by the other watchpoint kids.

She chuckled a little as Rei and Aedan were overwhelmed by questions about stunt work or the “Ninja camping trip.” Mercy watched Rei’s face as she talked, her own deep gray eyes flicking back to Mercy as she tried to break out of the crowd. The gray-white streak in her hair from Urdr Labs was still there, but she seemed to be carrying herself differently than the last time she saw her. There was a warmth about her. Mercy felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to see Genji.

“Oh--” was all that fell out of her and in an instant the were wrapped up in a tight embrace.

“What happened?” she asked, as Genji clicked at the catches on his faceplate and took it off, “Did it go well?”

He just kissed her in response and her arms tightened around him. Glad they were back. Glad they were safe. They broke away briefly, still holding each other.

“She was amazing,” said Genji, looking over at Rei.

“Then she----” Mercy looked over at Rei, and then back at Genji.

“She got the dragon back,”  said Genji. There was a slight shake to his voice of excitement and the fear that it might not be real. 

Tears brimmed in Mercy’s eyes and she put a hand over her mouth. “How?” she blurted out, “What happened?”

“Guys--! Guys!” Aedan’s voice cut over the din of the others, “I can’t really stay here, I need to get to the infirmary lab--”

“Infirmary lab?” Mercy repeated. Her eyes flicked over Genji’s armor, seeing several new scratches and dents in it.

“Oh no...” she said quietly.

“It’s fine, we’re fine,” Genji gave her shoulders a light squeeze.

Genji’s smile shrank slightly and he looked up from Mercy to Jack, “We’d better debrief.” he said, his hands still on Mercy’s shoulders. He broke away from her only for Rei to manage to nearly tackle her in a hug.

“Oof! Sunneschii, I’m not one of your stunt buddies,” said Mercy, stroking Rei’s hair before returning the embrace. 

“I got it back,” Rei said, her arms tight around Mercy, “It’s  _back._ ”

“I’ve heard,” Mercy kissed her forehead before cupping Rei’s face in her hands, “I’m  _so happy_  for you.”

Rei’s cheeks squished slightly against Mercy’s palms as she grinned, eyes bright. Mercy smiled right back.

“But I’m guessing the trip wasn’t all sunshine, roses, and dragons, was it?” said Mercy, looking over at Genji.

“Yeeahhh,” Rei rubbed the back of her neck, “Aedan’s right, we gotta get to the lab and... you should probably find somewhere comfortable to sit.”

\----

“...A Reaper clone,” Mercy repeated, interlacing her fingers and bringing her elbows up on the conference table just outside the infirmary. The whir of centrifuges could be heard outside of the room, punctuated only by the scratch of Rei’s pencil on the yellow writing pad in front of her. Hanzo leaned against the wall next to the door, typing out his own written debriefing on a tablet.

“Well, not technically---” Aedan started.

“A clone is a 100% copy and this one is clearly edited, yes, I’m sure. If they directly cloned Gabriel as he is now, the embryo would likely never stabilize,” said Mercy, “But  _you’re_  sure?”

“We won’t really know until the gene sequencer isolates her nanites from mine in the samples I brought. Luckily she’s...” Aedan seemed to be searching for the right words, “ Her nanites are distinct from mine. Hardier. Even her wraith form was... denser.” 

“And she was strong too,” said Rei, continuing to sketch, “ _Crazy_  strong.”

“SEP serum?” Jack looked at Genji.

“Talon wouldn’t be able to get a stable sample of it off of Reaper alone,” said Mercy.

Jack glanced over at Rei, still furiously sketching, but now looking up between him and the yellow lined pad of paper in front of her as she worked.

“What?” said Jack.

“Sorry it’s just, you and her both had this thing with your nose...” said Rei, looking back down at the pad and sketching more.

“’Thing?’” Jack repeated, and then looked back at Genji’s whose eyes were unsettlingly fixed on him.

“...The eye color’s the same, too,” said Genji.

“Lot of people with blue eyes in the world, Genji,” said Jack.

“If Talon needed a stable source of the SEP serum...” Mercy started.

“Oh for--You can’t make one clone off of two people,” said Jack.

“Two X-Chromosomes,” said Mercy.

“If your remove the methylation of haplo DNA at the beginning of the process it’s not impossible at all,” said Aedan, “If Mum could slap a Y chromosome onto me, it’d probably be child’s play for her.” 

“But  _you_  said we still need to wait for the sequencer’s results,” said Jack, “She might not even be Gabe’s kid.”

“She might not be...” Aedan conceded, not breaking those bicolored eyes away from him.

An unsettling silence fell across all of them. Jack looked at Aedan and deep down, a part of him knew that if it was his mother in the room and not him, she’d be telling him to swallow his pride and accept that he knew full well what Talon was capable of, and how far they were willing to go.

Jack felt the eyes of everyone on the room on him. “Where would they even  _get_  my DNA?!” he snapped.

“Well... either Moira took samples of it when she left, or... they picked it up in the 30-odd years you’ve been fighting them,” said Mercy.

Another long silence passed among the group.

“We aren’t discussing this further until that sequencer gives us the results,” said Jack, walking toward the door, “I want a written debrief of the full Shirakami-Sanchi incident from all of you by 0800 hours tomorrow.”

“You’re storming off and giving us  _homework?_ ” said Rei.

Jack looked over his shoulder sharply at her. 

Rei cleared her throat, “Right. Written debrief. Standard procedure,” she said a bit meekly.

Jack turned away from her and walked out the door. It shut behind him.

“...Reaperclone definitely has two daddies,” muttered Rei.

Genji looked over her shoulder and picked up the yellow pad she had been sketching on.

“That is a very good likeness,” he said quietly.

“...Maybe it’s better that he didn’t see it,” said Mercy, taking the pad from Genji, her brow knitting together with worry.

\---

It was fairly late in the evening and Rei chewed on the end of her pen on the couch in the watchpoint living room, looking over a blank debriefing document and template. The Shimada-Ziegler family had had takeout for dinner that night, everyone already worn out either from the flight back from Japan, the exhaustion of relating what had happened there, and further discussion over lab results and She felt the arm of the couch sag behind her with another person’s weight.

“One of your few nights here and you’re stuck doing Overwatch paperwork,” Aedan said with a sigh.

“Oh, did you already finish yours, nerd?” said Rei, sitting up from the cushions slightly.

Aedan shrugged. “Lab intern,” he said with a slight smile, “You get good at the pencil-pushing.”

“You got a hole punched in your chest, how are you done first?” muttered Rei.

“It wasn’t punched, technically it was damage via displacement. And I get  _really_ nasty with the details,” said Aedan, “I want to ruin his breakfast.”

Rei snorted. “You shouldn’t joke about that,” she said quietly, “You almost...”

“It’s a coping mechanism,” Aedan said with a shrug, “Probably not a very good one but--woah!” 

Rei had reached up and grabbed him by his ‘Pipette, Cry, Repeat’ shirt and yanked him down onto the cushions next to her. Half his body weight was bearing down on her legs, but she didn’t mind, really. His own legs were still loosely draped over the arm of the couch, and he was staring up at the ceiling next to her as she penned out a few more notes of her debriefing. 

“So... what next?” said Aedan.

“Mm?” Rei glanced up from her writing.

“I mean... you had a life for yourself back in Hollywood.... you were Midori Rider.”

“I was a stunt,” said Rei with an eye-roll as she continued writing.

“You had the helmet--I mean, that’s not my point. My point is, you had a life for yourself outside of this---”

“This is bigger than that---” said Rei.

“What _you want_ in this is bigger than anything,” said Aedan, pushing himself up to an upright sitting position to look at her.

“Aedan--they cloned Reaper _._.. If I’ve got the dragon back, then I can’t just stand aside and play dress-up while my friends are in danger.”

“Just because I got a hole punched in my chest doesn’t mean you have to protect me 24/7,” said Aedan.

“It wasn’t punched, it was displaced.” said Rei, arching an eyebrow.

“Touché,” said Aedan.

“Aedan...” Rei exhaled. “I did love the life I had outside of Overwatch... but it’s because I loved it that I know I have to fight for it,” she set the pen down on the clipboard and brushed her fingers along his forearm from where it was awkwardly jammed between them, “I think that’s part of what loving something means.”

“Guess ninjas are full of love then, aren’t they?” said Aedan with a grin.

“What do you think the Shimada dragon is made of?” said Rei, mysteriously.

A few seconds passed.

“What, seriously?” said Aedan.

Rei tried to push back a laugh but failed. “Pffft! No! I mean--I don’t  _know!_  Probably not...It’d be dumb if it was.” 

“You had me for a second,” said Aedan. 

Rei was snickering, “Nah, I’m hoping I’m going to figure that bit out... I don’t know when.. but soon. I’m going to ask Winston about it. But, well... in the meantime, I can help here. I can protect my family.”

Aedan stared at her for a few seconds. “So... you’re staying?”

“Yeah...” Rei said quietly, “Yeah, I think I am.” She smirked. “It’s what Midori Rider would do---fight alongside her friends! Save the world! The  _real_  Midori Rider, no stunt doubles here!” said Rei,  grinning and attempting to strike one of the sentai poses despite being half-reclined on the couch and holding a pen and clipboard in her hands. Her hands dropped back into her lap. She glanced down briefly, “And... I missed you. I missed all of you.” She pushed her hair back. “That clone...” she said quietly.

“Andrea,” said Aedan.

“Andrea?” repeated Rei.

“That’s what the voice in her earpiece addressed her as,” said Aedan.

“Well... Andrea said she was made to end this fight,” said Rei, “I want to end it too. But we’re going to end it  _our way._ ”

“Then I’ll see it through with you,” said Aedan, sitting up slightly.

“Aedan..” Rei smiled softly as he took her hand in his.

“ _Giorraíonn beirt bothar,_ Rei,” he said with a grin, “I told you. Lost puppy.” 

\---

It was well past midnight and Jack was leaning against the counter in the infirmary lab. He could wait. He knew he could wait. Let Mercy or the clone deliver the news while all tight-lipped over a tablet. But he couldn’t sleep. His prosthetic leg ached at its joint and he glanced down at his glass.. Malt whiskey from one of McCree’s long-forgotten stashes. He had no idea how old it was, only that it was one of the many casualties of McCree severely cutting back on his drinking after Rei was born, so... old. Could probably strip paint with it.

 The whirring of the centrifuges had long since stopped, but the screen of the main monitor had been at 89.15% for the past 15 minutes.

“How much longer?” said Jack.

“I’m still calculating the results, Commander,” responded Athena.

“Not commander anymore. Fifteen minutes longer or two hours longer?” said Jack.

“I could temporarily divert all the energy my user interface function to speed up the process,” said Athena.

“Why don’t you do that?”

“Force of habit from Winston, I suppose,” Athena replied, “I don’t feel right leaving someone alone if I’m all they have to talk to.”

“Ouch,” said Jack with a slight chuckle before sipping his drink and letting it sear his tongue, “It’s all right, Athena. I’d rather find out sooner.”

“I’ll be right back,” said Athena. There was a slight ‘vwoom’ of her speakers powering down and Jack was left in the dimly lit room for another 10 or so minutes. Jack idly watched the alcohol chew away at the two large ice cubes in his glass in the dim light of the room. He idly tapped away at some of Hanzo’s debriefing on his tablet before Athena spoke up again.

“And we’re back,” said Athena.

“Okay...” Jack took a breath, “Do your worst.”

“Based on analysis of the incompatible nanites extracted from O’Deorain, I can confirm that the Talon agent that attacked him and the Shimadas has both your DNA, and that of Gabriel Reyes.” 

Jack exhaled, then picked up the small yellow writing pad Rei had been sketching on earlier and saw she had sketched the face of a young woman. He made out his jawline--or at least the jawline he had back in all the posters, his nose, Gabriel’s eye shape, all large and tired, but cold and light with his own eye tone. 

He looked up from the sketch to the large letters reading “DATABASE MATCH” on Athena’s screen with his and Gabe’s old overwatch ID photos displayed prominently.

“Well fuck,” he said, before knocking back his drink.


End file.
